Zola (2020) Probably the closest modern cousin to Anora. Based on the infamous Twitter thread, Zola follows two strippers who take a road trip to Florida that quickly turns dangerous. There are multiple club scenes, lap dances, and nude background performers, but the movie is more tense than sexy. It shows stripping as work done under constant pressure from pimps, customers, and other dancers. Funny, stressful, and bleak in equal measure.
Strip Club Massacre (2017) A very low-budget slasher that takes place almost entirely in and around a strip club. The dancers are the main characters, and the movie wastes no time delivering nudity, lap dances, and backstage scenes. It’s not subtle or well-made, but it fits squarely into the “strippers in danger” lineage that Fear City kicked off.
Love Ranch (2010) Loosely inspired by Nevada’s Moonlite Bunny Ranch, this movie blends stripping, prostitution, and sex-work politics. There’s plenty of nudity and explicit sex, along with power struggles between workers and management. Helen Mirren runs the business with a calm, intimidating authority. Not a great film overall, but it’s blunt about sex work as an industry.
The Wrestler (2008) Marisa Tomei plays Cassidy, a stripper dealing with aging, burnout, and the slow realization that her body won’t always pay the bills. The film shows dressing-room routines, stage performances, lap dances, and the casual cruelty of customers. Tomei appears topless, and the stripping is presented as exhausting, repetitive labor. Easily one of the most grounded portrayals of stripping in a mainstream movie.
Go Go Tales (2007) Abel Ferrara’s love letter to a dying New York strip club. Willem Dafoe plays the manic owner while the dancers perform, argue, get naked backstage, and spiral emotionally. Asia Argento and others appear topless, and the club scenes feel chaotic and sweaty rather than glamorous. The movie is uneven, but it captures the end-of-an-era feeling of early-2000s NYC nightlife really well.
Nice, I know one of the dancers from Strip Club Massacre, she dances at a local club and told me about her roll in the movie.