Boogie Nights (1997) on Netflix
In 1977 Torrance, teenage dishwasher Eddie Adams meets porn director Jack Horner at a Reseda nightclub. Renamed Dirk Diggler, he moves into Jack's house and becomes a star.
- Netflix3.6/5
- IMDb7.9/10309,777 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes94%
Trailer
Plot summary
Jack Horner directs pornographic films in the San Fernando Valley, financed by a man called the Colonel, with a regular company around him: Amber Waves, Reed Rothchild, Buck Swope, Rollergirl and assistant director Little Bill. Eddie Adams is seventeen, a high school dropout in Torrance who washes dishes at Maurice Rodriguez's Reseda nightclub and lives with an alcoholic mother who hits him. After a fight at home he moves into Jack's house. He takes the screen name Dirk Diggler and, on the strength of his looks, youth and physique, becomes a star. The money buys him a house, a wardrobe and a competition orange Corvette, and he and his co-star Reed Rothchild pitch action-themed porn films together.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Boogie Nights (1997)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Dirk Diggler is based on real-life porn actor John Holmes: the film grew out of Paul Thomas Anderson's high-school short The Dirk Diggler Story, which itself drew on the 1981 documentary Exhausted: John C. Holmes, The Real Story.
- Leonardo DiCaprio was Anderson's first choice for Eddie Adams but had to pass because he had already signed for Titanic; he recommended his Basketball Diaries co-star Mark Wahlberg, and later called turning the film down the biggest regret of his career.
- Joaquin Phoenix was also offered the role of Eddie Adams before Wahlberg but turned it down over concerns about playing a porn star.
- Before Burt Reynolds and Don Cheadle were cast, the roles of Jack Horner and Buck Swope were turned down or passed over for Bill Murray, Harvey Keitel, Warren Beatty, Albert Brooks, Sydney Pollack, and Samuel L. Jackson.
- Anderson originally wanted Boogie Nights to run over three hours and carry an NC-17 rating; when producer Michael De Luca insisted on an R or a shorter cut, Anderson chose the R rating as a personal challenge, and the finished film still ran 25 minutes shorter than promised.
- Burt Reynolds reportedly fired his own agent for recommending the film after seeing a rough cut, yet he went on to win a Golden Globe and earn an Oscar nomination for his performance as Jack Horner.
- The firecracker-throwing bit during the drug-deal scene wasn't scripted; Anderson wrote it in for his friend Joe G. M. Chan after seeing him do the same thing at a party. Actor Thomas Jane also said Reynolds tried to knee him in the crotch on set after Jane taunted him during a prank, and later sent Jane a six-pack of beer as an apology.
- Burt Reynolds wanted Jack Horner to have an Irish accent, and actually used one on his first day of shooting before dropping it the next day.
