Tag: Kevin Nash

There comes a time in every reviewers life when they have to watch a movie about Male Strippers. It isn’t a common topic. We got The Full Monty in the 90s, and then Magic Mike a few years ago, so we all just assumed it would be another decade and a half before a new one came along.

But Magic Mike was certainly popular and certainly made a lot of bank. And for good reason! It was the beginning of the Matthew McConaughey road to greatness. And it was directed by Steven Soderbergh! And yes, sure, some good dancing.

That doesn’t mean I am not worried about the sequel, a continuation that is loosely inspired by Channing Tatum‘s real life story. No McConaughey for one. And instead of having the director of Ocean’s Eleven, Ocean’s Twelve, and Ocean’s Thirteen, we are instead stuck with the ASSISTANT DIRECTOR of Ocean’s Eleven, Ocean’s Twelve, and Ocean’s Thirteen.

And to top it all off, Soderbergh is only the Executive Producer, Cinematographer, and Editor of this movie.

Yep, clearly Magic Mike XXL is going to be a wildly different film.

This scene is like an even more male focused erotic 80’s metal music video.

Three years have passed since the dangerous and deadly events of the first film. Mike (Tatum) is no longer magical, after leaving the world of Male Entertainment behind and focusing on starting his own business, making things with wood. After these few years, he has one employee and times are still tough. But at least he gets to keep his clothes on, and only has to dance in his workhouse, alone, late at night.

But then the gang is stopping by the city. I’m talking Ken (Matt Bomer), Tito (Adam Rodriguez), Tarzan (Kevin Nash), Tobias (Gabriel Iglesias), and of course Big Dick Richie (Joe Manganiello). No, not Dallas or the other guy. They apparently closed shop and moved over seas for that foreign money, leaving the rest of the gang jobless and forced to find new passions in life.

However, before reality sets in, they are going to the Male Entertainment competition conference thing in Myrtle Beach, where groups of men dance and strip for hundreds of ladies. It is a big event and they want to go out with a bang. And you know, tons of dollar bills.

They just have to get there first. And this road trip will have them stop at a few different types of clubs, meeting new people for their crew/team, and maybe even having the men discover what they want to do after they are done male entertaining.

Also featuring Stephen Boss, Donald Glover, Amber Heard, Jada Pinkett Smith, Andie MacDowell, and Elizabeth Banks.

I didn’t actively avoid shirtless pics, but the one group shot the internet has sans shirts is terrible!

Let me start this out by saying that Magic Mike XXL is a better movie than Magic Mike. And I have quite a few reasons too!

1) The sequel has more dancing. That is fantastic news, because that is one of the main focuses of the film. The worse Step Up movies are the ones that try to have too much plot and not enough booty shaking. I want to see awesome dances to hot beats, damn it, and there is a whole lot of that in this movie.

2) There is no Cody Horn in this movie. None. Not even a picture. Just a few references. She is out of the picture and was by far the worst part of the first film. And the film elevates because of it.

3) The other dancers have personality. This could be partially true about the first film, but I don’t remember that much at all about our other male dancers. It was all about Magic Mike and that new guy. The other dancers all feel like real people, and it was fascinating seeing them all get their moments, have their own unique dances at the end, and really bond with them. The male bondage in this film is extraordinary. They all feel like real friends and they have great chemistry.

And really, that is all I need. Sure, some parts of the movie get really awkward, and maybe some of the dancers are far far too sexual for my tastes, but I am able to forgive most of that. The romance in this film was bad, but not as bad as the first.

This film actually left me wanting more from these dudes, seeing how their lives turn out since they are more than just background characters now. Especially Big Dick Richie, who had the best subplots in the film.

Movies about male strippers aren’t very common in the world for whatever reason. Women strippers? Sure. But men? Nah. Which is shocking, given the large success of the last male stripping movie I’ve seen, The Full Monty. So why not Magic Mike? Only like a 14 year difference or so. That is incredibly small amount of male stripper movies.

But when you also decide to make this movie pseudo-biographical? Yes. Apparently it is inspired and slightly based off of Channing Tatum‘s early life, when he was a male exotic dancer. Well, that just makes it heartfelt. I guess.

We at Gorgview.com would like to note that we are not sexist, and as such we are fine with men being turned into objects, just like women.

In the heart of Tampa is a dangerous part of town. Sexydangerous. A male strip club, that is only open three nights of the week, where women go to flip a shit over men getting almost naked and dancing. Lead by Dallas (Matthew McConaughey), a now slightly older showman who never strips himself, he brings on energy and a good time to any lady who has the cash. Their biggest act is Mike (Tatum), now 30 years and still showing off his strong dance moves. Other dancers include Tito (Adam Rodriguez), Ken (Matt Bomer), Tarzan (Kevin Nash), and Big Dick Richie (Joe Manganiello).

While working on a construction gig, Mike runs into Adam (Alex Pettyfer), just a 19 year old kid, who is pretty down on his luck. After a few run ins, he has him stop by to help run props for the dancers, and due to an accident, he is thrown onto the stage to strip without any real training! Well it works out, kind of, so he joins full time. And he has a sister, non approving Brooke (Cody Horn). Mike would totally persue that, you know, if she wasn’t so stuck up, didn’t already have a boyfriend, and if he didn’t kind of have a weird thing going on with Joanna (Olivia Munn).

Either way, Adam is introduced to the living large lifestyle, and gets pretty deep pretty fast. Mike himself would rather stop stripping eventually, and work with his hands, building customer furniture. Once banks give him a damn loan (shitty credit dealing only with cash), and you know, if he didn’t have to pay off other miscellaneous purchases. Oh yeah, and Gabriel Iglesias is the club DJ, but as he is Hispanic, he is also a drug dealer.

To further clarify our non-sexism, here is some women potentially being objectified as well.

So, surprisingly I guess, the movie wasn’t completely terrible. Was there lots of eye candy for the females? Sure. But the dance moves / performances were generally mostly good, with some big exceptions. Even some funny moments. But the biggest problems really came from a technical stand point.

Generally, I found the transition between scenes to pretty bad in this movie. It opens to the McConaughey “do not touch” monologue from the trailer, but then goes to a black title screen with JUNE on it. Alright. I have no idea why though. I guess the first scene wasn’t June, and now it is? Or we are in a flash back? No, they just arbitrarily decided to tell you the current month that way, fine.

But besides that, scenes would end a little bit too long after the joke, or just at other awkward moments, never flowed too naturally. They also tried to do a lot of long shots for conversation scenes, which were hit and miss. Most of the time they were a miss if they involved Cody Horn, who was pretty bad in this movie. I guess her character was supposed to have a disapproving look 100% of the time on her face, but holy crap was it annoying.

Finally, Kevin Nash. What the fuck. He played the bigger male stripper, but whenever there was a group dance scene, I couldn’t pay attention to the sweet break dancing, because every time he was on camera he looked out of place. Dancing like a robot, not doing much at all. They could have easily gotten a big guy who can actually jump, no idea why they went to shit with him.

I’d say the plot wasn’t the best, but the (mostly) well choreographed dance scenes earn it a watch.