FILM FRENZY

Alex Pettyfer, Matthew McConaughey, and Channing Tatum in Magic Mike (Photo: Warner)

By Matt Brunson

MAGIC MIKE
★★½ (out of four)
DIRECTED BY Steven Soderbergh
STARS Channing Tatum, Matthew McConaughey

Less of a Saturday Night Fever and more of a Friday evening shrug, Magic Mike follows the template of that John Travolta disco tale by starting off as a bright movie full of dance moves and music before turning into something decidedly darker.

Channing Tatum, working from a screenplay that was loosely based on his own days as an exotic dancer, stars as Mike, the hottest male stripper working at a joint owned by the silky-smooth Dallas (scene-stealing Matthew McConaughey). Mike dreams of one day opening his own custom-furniture shop, but for now, he’s content doing the bump-and-grind, along the way pegging 19-year-old slacker Adam (Alex Pettyfer) as a natural for this line of work. Adam is nicknamed “The Kid,” although thankfully nobody ever utters that age-old adage, “You’re going out there a kid, but you’re coming back a star!”

Yet a star is precisely what Adam becomes, which leads to the expected second-half hardships focusing on his plunges into drug use and casual sex. Yet because Adam was a zero from the moment we met him, this descent into debauchery doesn’t reflect any significant character change, and it’s hard to get worked up over his fate. Far more interesting are Mike’s relationships with the others around him — this includes Adam’s sister, nicely played by Cody Horn. And even more interesting would have been a deeper analysis of the exotic-dancer business, such as why male strippers are generally viewed by the population at large as fun-loving party guys while female strippers are often tagged in more tragic (and puritanical) terms.

But Magic Mike has no time for such complexities: It’s only here to take your money, offer some slick entertainment, and clear the room before the next show.