Directed by: Steven Soderbergh
Starring: Channing Tatum, Alex Pettyfer, Cody Horn, Matthew McConaughey
Rated: R
110 minutes
Channing Tatum (left) and Alex Pettyfer portray male strippers in “Magic Mike.” (Courtesy photo)
“Why am I here?” I thought. “Why have I come to see ‘Magic Mike’?”
I awkwardly bought my ticket, took my seat in a theater filled with women anxious to see the Male Stripper Movie, and hoped that Steven Soderbergh (“Ocean’s Eleven”) would have something better to offer than a cinematic ladies’ night.
Well, “Magic Mike” isn’t just a stripping movie (thank goodness). It’s a surprisingly sensitive story about a man trying to be good and do what he wants with his life, despite compelling forces pulling him elsewhere.
Mike Lane (Channing Tatum, “Step Up”) is a small-time entrepreneur. He runs a construction crew; he does car details; he wants to make custom furniture. But his most lucrative venture of all is his late-night stripteases for hordes of ecstatic women. On stage he is not Mike, but Magic Mike, a legend, the pride and joy of the club’s owner and emcee, Dallas (Matthew McConaughey, “The Lincoln Lawyer”).
One day Mike meets Adam (Alex Pettyfer, “I Am Number Four”), a college dropout living on his sister’s couch. Mike reaches out to Adam, affectionately calling him the Kid and introducing him to the strip club, where Dallas takes an interest in the newcomer. Soon Adam is one of the strippers, much to the chagrin of his sister, Brooke (Cody Horn, “Flipped”).
Mike reassures Brooke that there’s nothing to worry about, but of course things get seedy. Adam gets drawn into a shady world of drugs, sex, and money that he isn’t prepared for, leaving Brooke and Mike unsure what to do; he’s old enough to make his own decisions, but they don’t want him getting hurt. And when Dallas announces a big move for the strip club, Mike has to decide whether he wants to stay with Adam and the job or if he wants to pursue a new venture in life.
This is one of those movies where it’s never clear who the bad guy is (if there is one) or what everything is leading up to. And yet, it doesn’t wander aimlessly; the tension builds well, and then fizzles out not in one climactic moment, but a few. It is arguably a very sophisticated script, but it could be mistaken for a grossly inconsistent script. Frankly, I’m not sure which it is, but writer Reid Carolin treads the line carefully, and Soderbergh’s flashy direction provides the oil that keeps everything running smoothly.
What we get, then, is a movie that shows a few months in the life of a guy trying to make his way. The muddling of story arcs and subplots works to the movie’s advantage, making it a series of ups and downs that don’t feel mundane.
To this end, the performances by the actors are all fairly understated, sometimes even excessively so. Channing Tatum delivers a strong performance as the ironically unassuming Mike, whose earnest daytime persona stands in contrast to his nighttime excesses. Like everyone, he is ruled by money, and Tatum portrays this with a subtle understanding that that’s just how things are.
The siblings, Adam and Brooke, are played with understatement bordering on lackluster energy. Alex Pettyfer is at times sympathetic and believable as a kid who doesn’t know what he’s getting into, but at other times he can just frustrate us by being so low-key. Similarly, Cody Horn’s Brooke is sometimes a charmingly grounded foil to Mike, but often comes off as overly shrewd.
The real gem of this movie is McConaughey, who has found the role he was meant to play. It’s as if he’s living all his fantasies as a Texas-accented, sleazy, self-obsessed show-off, and it’s all perfectly suited to the movie. His Dallas is reminiscent of Joel Grey’s Emcee in “Cabaret,” in the nature of both the role and the acting. McConaughey steals his scenes, and we’re happy to let him.
This movie could very well have been terrible, and as it is it borders on the gratuitous. But Soderbergh injects style and honesty into this world, and as a result we get a movie that isn’t about stripping, nor is it about the dark side of glamor. “Magic Mike” is about having the courage to do what you want, and the struggle not to lose sight of that goal. And if that story can be told in a strip club, so be it. Just don’t expect something wholesome.
Danny Eisenberg is a 2010 graduate of the Bromfield School and is currently a student at the University of Pennsylvania.
