Sasha Grey Wows In The Girlfriend Experience

I was lucky enough to get into a screening of the new Steven Soderbergh movie “The Girlfriend Experience”, starring porn star Sasha Grey. Now hold your horses there for a second… this is Oceans 11-13 director Soderbergh, and this is adult film actress Sasha Grey. By definition alone it should be something pretty amazing, no? A badass romp through the seedy underworld of porn?

It isn’t, exactly. Let me backtrack a little.

Sash Grey isn’t your average porn star. When one thinks of porn stars, the image of a blonde haired blue eyed girl from the San Fernando valley comes to mind. I’ll let you fill in the rest. Sasha, on the other hand, looks more like the really cute girl at the record store – fighting the stereotype with a healthy dose of good press – apparently she’s into obscure art movies, has her own experimental noise band, and oh, by the way, is only 22 years old. I suggest you Google her in the privacy of your own home, but the girl certainly makes a break from the classic porn look entirely. With other stars of like mind such as Dana Dearmond and Tatum Reed, she’s making pornography … can I say it? … much more of an open minded experience than the seedy weirdness that 90% of porn seems to revel in.

Now, one can have whatever views they want on the subject of pornography and I won’t try to change their mind. There are right wingers that hate it flat out and there’s also a ton of people that think it puts women in a position of power by, to borrow a phrase I overheard, “handing them back their own sexuality” and letting them call the shots with their own bodies. If you ask me, Sasha is 100% achieving the latter in this movie. It’s a pretty slow burning tale about a high priced call girl and her day to day life. She has a live-in boyfriend who is a personal trainer; it’s interesting to correlate the relationship between a personal trainer trying to sell a “buddy” experience in order to better sell his totally legal training expertise) – and Sasha’s role as the call-girl who tries to sell a “girlfriend experience” in order to better sell her body. She’s not some 1-900 meet-you-by-the-airport call girl… as depicted in the movie, she is more like a girlfriend to them than anything else. It’s just that she pays by the hour.

There are a few scenes having to deal with the economic crisis and Soderbergh makes a good point in maintaining the reality factor of this movie. The men who pay for Sasha’s experience aren’t weirdo John’s in overcoats and unmarked white vans – they’re well rounded individuals that pay for someone to listen first and fuck later; very well acted by the character actors and make the whole movie pop. Soderbergh shoots the film in a gritty yet very jazzy way that moves fast yet slows down to let you catch your breath at just the right times. His influence on what goes on on the screen is immeasurable, but unlike – say – Zack Snyder or Kevin Smith – he doesn’t enforce his presence on the actors and merely hangs back, letting the story tell itself. It’s a great looking film. Also it should be noted that the score wouldn’t sound out of place in any given coffee shop – Soderbergh’s use of simple drum sounds in the movie make it come off with a beatnik swagger almost until the very last frame.

Simply put I loved the movie. It’s fantastic. Sasha isn’t a great actress in the classical sense but there’s no denying her on screen presence. Her lack of formal training makes her come off pretty detached, but happily this adds more to the film than takes anything away from it.

It’s out on the 22nd of May in select cities. If you get the chance to see this while it’s out you’re very lucky, this won’t be in theaters as long as per-say Iron Man or other Hollywood movies, but it’ll be an experience that’ll stick with you and well worth your money.

Also, Check out Sasha Grey modeling American Apparels backless tights!