Vitals

Matt Dillon as Sam Lombardo, shady high school guidance counselor

South Florida, Spring 1999

Film: Wild Things
Release Date: March 20, 1998
Director: John McNaughton
Costume Designer: Kimberly A. Tillman

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Wild Things is one of those movies I remember being disregarded as a sleazefest, mostly due to Matt Dillon’s illicit ménage à trois with Neve Campbell and Denise Richards (which, of course, made eight-year-old me all the more interested in seeing it). But time has been kinder to John McNaughton’s twisty erotic thriller, which has grown a cult following in the 28 years since its release this week in March 1998. Even at the time, critics like Roger Ebert, Janet Maslin, and Gene Siskel were able to praise elements of it, albeit not without feeling compelled to note that it was—in Ebert’s words—”lurid trash.” Continue reading →