Film Reviews

The Girlfriend Experience (Steven Soderbergh): 77, Sasha Grey, real life porn star, is Chelsea, high end call girl, in Soderbergh’s new film. Film centers around Chelsea and her ‘boyfriend’ Chris and is told in an non-chronological order much like The Limey. Even with that, the film fits right along side the Oceans series both in terms of look and politics with Bubble being at the other end of the spectrum. (Enough references for ya! My point is that this is not just some minor work of Soderberg’s, but another exercise in addressing concerns both thematic and formal that he has been working with his entire career.) Soderbergh uses the upper class not only for the visual use of high end apartments, clothing, dinning, and recreation, (which I feel are much more visually rich, interesting, and alien then the urban poor) but also to talk about our current economic state highlighting both the excess and hardships. Sales, service and sex are no longer reliable and within the film there is a reversal of traditional roles. The ‘johns’, esp. her boyfriend, are figuratively pimping themselves out trying to attract different clients, while Chelsea is trying to compete by making contacts, creating a web presence, and responding to negative reviews. Truly, this is what both parties need to do to stay competitive and for advancement, and in the end they both sacrifice what they already had for opportunities that never arrive. Great montage sequences, you get three, but feel effortless like he went into autopilot or something. Apparently this is also OnDemand but I couldn’t find it, I think the release of it came and went which kind of defeats the purpose, right?

Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson): 89, third viewing- first is about four years, Film operates like an album or simply like music and must be seen in one uninterrupted sitting or the rhythm is shot to hell and doesn’t carry the same impact. Anderson creates characters out of backstory and juxtaposition, and intercuts between them not necessary for narrative but emotional purposes with one of the most hypotonic scores I know holding everything together. Perfect execution with every shot, pan, and cut exactly in the right place and a consistently moving camera as well. Still not really sure what it’s ‘about’ and really I don’t care. He touches on some loose themes of trust, part patriarchical abandonment/fall, and the limits of forgiveness. First 90mins are perfect and there’s definitely a rise and fall with the crest right at the half way mark. Would be a hands down masterpiece if it was maybe a little shorter (and we’re only talking like 10mins) and didn’t use incest as the lazy way out. His masterpiece does come later with Punch-Drunk Love.