Review of The Girlfriend Experience (2009) by First L — 04 Dec 2009

Grey is peculiarly, insurmountably blank, in a way that would perhaps work in her favour in porn (where the viewer might project onto her, or be assured she needs someone or thing to fill her up), but proves tedious and unengaging in a 15-rated arty meandering.

.. Just as "The Informant!" gabbled away while remaining entirely mute on the subject of corporate liability, "The Girlfriend Experience" goes big on brand names, cash-in-hand transactions, pumped-up asshole characters talking deals and wondering whom they're going to screw over next - without the inflection that might suggest their director finds them anything other than completely fascinating.

(It's the default position of someone who's spent too long in the boardrooms of Warner Bros. discussing "Ocean's 14": he's become inured to all the bullshit.) Rather than enthused or liberated, this - the most overtly experimental of Soderbergh's four releases this year - feels terribly jaded: cold, heartless, utterly solipsistic, it's easily one of the director's worst films.