Excellent, a Must See

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Here in Australia there is an extraordinary statistic which tells us that the majority of students at the biggest university in the country work in the sex industry. You see, study is expensive. Who wants to slave away at McDonald's for hours after class to buy books and pay off student loans when you can make ten times that much for a fraction of the time spent? There is obviously an interesting movie to be made here. This is not that movie. I knew a girl who paid her way through law school by working as an escort. Any one of her stories about "clients" would be more interesting than this.As the title implies, Chelsea/Christine, the main character, is an escort who also goes out on dates with her clients. She also meets regularly with a journalist who is apparently writing an article about her. This is funny, because as either Christine or Chelsea, the prostitute alter ego, this woman doesn't say a single interesting thing throughout the entire movie. The only interesting characters are the "clients", and yet they're paying Chelsea for her time, not just for sex.It is tempting to critique Sasha Grey's performance, but the script doesn't give her much to do right, let alone wrong. It's a one note character, and a one note performance."The Girlfriend Experience" also refrains from making any kind of statement about this strange, shocking situation that so many students are in now. It's just Chelsea visiting different men.It has occurred to me that the repetition of these scenes makes it deliberately confusing as to who the men are. At first, you assume they are all clients Chelsea is servicing. Then, you realise that Chelsea is Christine with some, one is a boyfriend, the other is a journalist interviewing her. Is the point that for someone in Christine's situation, men are interchangeable, and it is hard to tell clients from spouses? This is not the way any of the real-life sex workers I have heard from describe their work and private lives, but hey, I'll take meaning where I can get it.

The cinematography is intriguing and pleasant for most of the film and it had potential, though there are some flaws with the plot and main character.Perhaps with more character development and longer run time, Sasha Grey could have shown depth, but I found it was an unrealistic representation of high class escort work. Unlike what other reviews say, she would not need to be "less boring" in real life to make $2000/hr, although she would have limited regular clientele (i.e. probably not "the best" at what she does in the area as suggested). Some of her struggles in the film appeared unnatural and more like very mild daily struggles an escort encounters (stalkers? Taxes? Family of client? Clients pushing boundaries? Clients wanting exclusivity? "Friends" in the industry being untrustworthy? Bumping into someone and client hears your real name?).Less important but aside from this, the brand names recited were all pronounced very wrong, which appears even less likely she is actually shopping at those NY stores (kikidm - which is named after an historical figure). If you are familiar with high end lingerie boutiques + escorting you are bound to hear their proper name because you are probably going in person and paying in cash!I expected Grey to be a better fit for this role, as she had worked in the adult industry and and seems like a smart lady. It would have been nice to show some deeper client-escort conversations, or on the other end, some sort of personal emotional experience but neither occurred significantly; she must have something motivating her to continue this work? (Money is not enough after a while to do something you don't really care for, with people you don't fancy, and always interferes with a normal personal life)In summary, they should have consulted several real life escorts (not ones that rely on celebrity status for 2 hour novelty appointments either) and included one or two events that do not fall into the "ideal and unrealistic" sex work life depiction. Also - does not take much to decently pronounce french names...

The Girlfriend Experience is almost fascinatingly awful. Not a case of 'so bad it's good', but one to chew over, to list just how many different shades of empty it featured. And then forget it forever, or until you enrol for BA Media, Social Networks and Comms at the University of Inanity.At one and the same moment, it is and is not about the financial meltdown, is and is not about commerce, about the Big Apple. It's definitely not about the 'big O'. As far as I could see, desire was not one of the themes being explored. Curious omission, wouldn't you agree.The director and his 'breakthrough' star seem determined to carry her as far from her hardcore persona as they can; in short, by making her behaviour seem fairly normal, or more accurately, how might your everyday young woman with no acting experience respond to the task of playing the role of an escort? This is why I referred to 'assisted reality': reality being the context for banal dialogue. Tedious conversation, of which this film is bursting.Sasha Grey, unsurprisingly, gives Chelsea no personality, no inner life. She listens to rich men monotone about money and their woes, her eyes glazed over, and later we hear her dispassionately relate what went on once they got back to the bedroom. Don't expect any kinky scenes and don't look forward to the sort of demented energy she habitually put into her xxx scenes. Her character, Chelsea, is vapid and wholly unbelievable as a super high class hooker, much less as someone's actual girlfriend. The man playing her boyfriend puts more energy into his performance but it is still devoid of interest.The trouble is, this isn't a documentary, an analysis of venality or the greed is good culture, but nor is it a study of eroticism or desire. So when Chelsea speaks highly of her own skills as a seductress, we can't relate to it; when an unsatisfied client rubbishes her on the web, it's all too true.To sum up, the visual style is drab and wearying, the outbursts of music jarring and irrelevant. Nobody had their heart in this project. The film's emptiness would seem to reflect the emptiness of Sasha Grey in real life, often described as glacially detached, but written up as brainy and sophisticated by idiots basing their opinion solely on what goes on her 'likes' list.Maybe it says something about the world we've moved into. Hasn't Soderbergh retired now?

This disappoints hugely and I know why - Soderbergh and his bunch of family-guy buds who wrote/produced this have no concept whatsoever of what the escort-business is about: highly socialized prostitution! They clown around with a way too young and unsophisticated porn star (dress-up doll as a call-girl) like a bunch of puppies. 'Escort' is very sophisticated and serious business and has been covered very well in: 'Half Moon Street' and 'The Man from Elysian Fields'. Soderbergh should stick to the hand-held gritty stuff he does so very well: Sex, Lies and Videotape, Out of Sight, Erin Brokovitch, The Limey, Traffic, et al. He is totally out of his depth here - an embarrassment. Reminded me a bit of his miss with the quasi documentary: Full Frontal. Then it struck me - Soderbergh is attempting to fill the shoes of Robert Altman, whose docu. ensemble pieces were superb: Nashville, The Player, Short Cuts, A Prarie Home Companion - even Mash held the right balance of ensemble v. star power.Steven directs star-power very well: Julia Roberts, George Clooney, JLo, Catherine & Michael, Benicio, Terrence Stamp, etc. There is no one with even a pulse in this sad spectacle.