I Finally Saw Magic Mike

I am a red blooded American woman and being so I can appreciate the male form. Don't get me wrong I am happily married woman and would never stray but if someone wants to make a movie about a bunch of good looking guys dancing around shirtless I am not going to look away.  So when I saw previews for Magic Mike starring Tatum Channing and Mathew McConaughy I knew I would eventually see it.  I didn't go see it at the theaters and I didn't get it at the Redbox.  Instead I waited patiently for it to come to the library.  We get a lot of our movies at the library, you can can put a list of things you want at the library and when those things come in they will put them on a holding shelf for you.  Last Friday I got an email telling me that it was on the holding shelf for us, so I went and got it.  Last Friday night I got a chance to watch it.

Magic Mike is a movie about a male stripper named Mike played by Channing Tatum who is using the strip club to help him get more out of life, he is saving up his money and wants to open a custom furniture business.  He is in his 30's and knows that his days as a stripper are numbered and he is hoping to have a good future.

The club he works at is owned by Dallas who is played by Mathew McConaughy.  Mike is the number one dancer and he also gets extra money for going out and bringing in clients.  Mike also works construction during the day.  When a new good looking young man named Adam (Alex Pettyfer) shows up to work on a construction job Mike sees him as a potential way to bring more young women in to the club.  So he brings him in to the club and soon he becomes the newest attraction.  Mike is kind of the mentor of this younger guy and when Mike meets Adam's sister Brooke (Cody Horn) he kind of likes her and promises he will watch over the kid and keep him safe.

The rest of the movie revolves around the atmosphere of the club and the sordid lives of the male strippers.

This was one of those movies that made me say, "I will never get those two hours of my life back." once I was done watching it.  The ending was abrupt and disappointing.  The camera angles were terrible and the camera seemed far away through much of the movie.  During the dance scenes I felt like I was sitting in the back of the club having trouble seeing the dancers.  Honestly they could have got some closer shots of the dancers.  After all that is what all the ladies who watched the movie wanted to see.  The girl who played the love interest just seemed disconnected and she and Tatum had no chemistry together.  The sound was even bad.  There was one redeeming quality or perhaps two.  McConaughy always brings a decent performance and he did the best job possible in this badly produced move.  the other redeeming quality was Channing Tatum, although disappointing with the chemistry with his love interest he did a good job with the rest of the film and his dancing scenes were excellent.  He has had dance training and was actually a male stripper in real life before he became an actor.  His dance scenes were really well done, not really from a stripper stand point, as I think he performed a lot better and danced a lot more than a typical stripper would.

Other than a few fleeting moments and a couple of good dance scenes the movie was a total waste of my time and a big let down.