Magic Mike

More Boogie Nights than Showgirls, Steven Soderbergh’s Magic Mike showcases the dark side of the high life, in this case, the nonstop party of a male strip club in Tampa, Fla. Taken (one assumes somewhat liberally) from star Channing Tatum’s own background as an exotic dancer, Magic Mike has a few stripping sequences, but Soderbergh always manages to make each dance less about strippers getting tips and more about the emotional content of the film in that moment. It’s a tricky way to go about showing Tatum and Matthew McConaughey in thongs, but by and large, the sequences in the club act in the service of a film that is a lot darker below the surface than its opening moments suggest. Tatum has found his mark; McConaughey is solid in what may or may not be self-parody; and Soderbergh again demonstrates his skill when he’s deeply invested in a project.