Review: Magic Mike

By Rob Christopher in Arts & Entertainment on Jul 2, 2012 3:05PM

On our way into the theater we overheard a girl say, "It's too bad it's not in 3-D. C'mon, 3-D abs!"

Any audience going to see a movie about male stripers is ready and anxious to see copious amounts of bare skin, whether that audience is gay men, straight ladies, or their boyfriends who are somewhat sheepishly tagging along. And there's certainly plenty of flesh in Magic Mike. But director Steven Soderbergh, much like Robert Altman (to whom he is too infrequently compared), is a filmmaker who follows his own curiosity; viewers may get what they want but it'll be in the way he chooses. Sometimes his approach hits the audience's sweet spot perfectly (Erin Brockovich, Ocean's 11), sometimes it seems to have no effect at all (like Haywire, which despite being a kickass action flick was all but ignored at theaters).

If the reaction of the audience at the screening we went to is a barometer, Magic Mike definitely hits the sweet spot. Beginning with a moment in the very first scene that elicited full-blown gasps of titillation from the entire theater, everyone went bananas over the movie's combination of unabashed nudity and energetic dance numbers (and make no mistake, Channing Tatum is an impressive dancer, as well as incredibly hot to watch). But we doubt that many in the audience were expecting the thoughtful, sometimes disquieting perspective that Soderbergh brings to the story. Because at heart Magic Mike is a thoroughly working class tale about characters who just can't fit into the economic mainstream, and it's told from a bro's perspective. When Mike (played by Tatum) is turned down for a bank loan, yet again, it isn't because he has bad credit—he has no credit. As he puts it delicately to the loan officer, "I work in cash-based businesses."

Mike's dream is to start his own custom furniture business, but for now the most lucrative of his many side gigs is strip-dancing at a local club owned by Dallas, a smarmy, smooth-talking ex-stripper played by Matthew McConaughey. Oily and riveting, McConaughey's performance is the movie's biggest surprise. Dallas appears to have gone without washing his hair for several seasons, but when he launches into a randy ode titled "Ladies of Tampa" the gals in the club's audience work themselves in a frenzy. Another unforgettable scene in a dance rehearsal studio has Dallas tutoring the Kid, an aimless 19-year old novice, in the fine art of stripping. After offering some pointers he commands the Kid to "fuck the mirror." And, wow, he does.

The entire cast is right on the money. And, let's face it, easy on the eyes, especially drool-worthy Alex Pettyfer as the Kid. Kudos must go to the screenplay, by Lake Forest native Reid Carolin, which bothers to create actual characters rather than trotting out the usual showbiz stereotypes. A subplot featuring Cody Horn as the Kid's sister, a girl that Mike finds himself falling for, is (gasp!) handled with genuine maturity. But is isn't all drama; the movie uses tear-away pants, allusions to manscaping, and a strategically placed penis pump to hilarious effect.

Once again Soderbergh also served as his own cinematographer, and he continues to demonstrate the unique strengths of digital cinema. His controlled but unfussy shooting style features striking washes of color (including a blue and red neon montage and a particularly gorgeous sequence on a sandbar beach) that could best be described as pragmatic impressionism—he's setting a mood but doing so in ways that feel effortless. As Soderbergh said in a recent Chicago Tribune interview, "I have to respond instinctually during production, not intellectually. When I think back on the past 15 years in particular, those movies — what's wrong in any of them has nothing to do with how quickly they were made, and almost everything that works has come out of the fact that they were made quickly." It's something Robert Altman himself might have said (and wouldn't The Company and Magic Mike would make a fascinating on a double bill?)

Don't skip Magic MIke just because you're not part of the "target" audience. Take it from Mack Rawden: "If you’re a straight guy and you don’t go see this film, you’re not a clever bastard who successfully bartered with his girlfriend, you’re a dumbass who made the wrong decision."