Oiled Up: Magic Mike XXL (Review)
Magic Mike XXL pumps up the muscles and the fun
Magic Mike XXL (
) is an oiled-up, hilariously erotic musical. Three years after Steven Soderbergh released his ode to men who strip — plastering the asses of Matthew McConaughey and Channing Tatum on theater screens around the world — this sequel by director Gregory Jacobs unshackles itself from the serious whispers of its predecessor. There’s a glee to it, an unrestrained satisfaction that sizzles on each frame: we cannot believe they let us make another one of these, so let’s go wild.
Men strip in convenience stores, in workshops, in the sitting rooms of Southern mansions. They choreograph their performances in hours, then turn women to putty in seconds. There seems to be no place that isn’t an appropriate setting for their muscle tees and rip-away pants. They come, they strip, they conquer.
As the movie begins, Mike Lane (Tatum) is running the furniture business he pined to open throughout Magic Mike. He doesn’t sell his body on stage anymore. Rather, he designs cabinets and desks and tables, hauling his work to clients across the Tampa area. And what of his girlfriend, Brooke, she who lured him away from a life of Ginuwine and thongs and bronzing oils? She’s out of the picture — seriously, she doesn’t even appear in the movie — leaving Mike mired in something akin to an existential crisis. When Big Dick Richie (Joe Manganiello), Ken (Matt Bomer), Tito (Adam Rodríguez), and Tarzan (Kevin Nash) come through town on their way to a strippers’ convention in Myrtle Beach, he’s powerless to say no. He wants back in. He wants to have some fun.
From there, Magic Mike XXL takes the boys through a series of set pieces that aim to get them stripping as quickly as possible. Jacobs and screenwriter Reid Carolin cut to the bone here — they recognize they’re telling a nutty story, so they never take it too seriously and the movie is better for it. Try not to laugh at the way avalanches of dollar bills blanket Ken. Try not to grin as women paw Richie’s chest. This is silly fun — and everyone knows it.
What separates Magic Mike XXL from Magic Mike, though, is the explicit way it endorses the sex appeal of vulnerability. Mike and his boys want to make women happy, so they perform in terms defined by women’s desires. They choose to abandon their old cliches — the “It’s Raining Men” routine from Soderbergh’s movie comes to mind — and create new dances that better reflect their personalities. Leading men in Hollywood movies rarely talk and act this way. It’s bare hearts and bare asses. It’s self-enlightenment in a g-string. It’s delightful.
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