This week, America’s most overrated filmmaker, Steven Soderbergh, gets booted out of the arena by the country’s most underrated great filmmaker, Walter Hill.

The simultaneous release of Hill’s Bullet to the Head and Soderbergh’s Side Effects perfectly contrasts the art of genre filmmaking with the pretense of art filmmaking as genre. After a decade off, Hill returns to cinema with a Sylvester Stallone action movie that streamlines moral complexity and aesthetic mastery while Soderbergh pretends another exploration of topical issues while dully manipulating thriller clichés.

Side Effects’ story of medical malfeasance involves a pill-giving psychiatrist (Jude Law) and his waif-victim patient (Rooney Mara)—the girl with an insider-trading monkey on her back. Really, it’s much less interesting than a law-breaking hitman forced to regulate his conscience in relentless tests of his manhood. The former is schlock, the latter is art—if you appreciate the depth and creativity of kinetic, poetic narrative. That legacy has always inspired Hill’s artistry.

Soderbergh’s Traffic, Erin Brokovich and Magic Mike reigned over an era of cynical banality, while Hill’s sharp, inventive technique seen in The Warriors, Geronimo and Undisputed went unappreciated (and underground in TV projects like Deadwood and Broken Trail). Bullet to the Head is an exhilarating revival of efficient, expressive storytelling while Side Effects combines Psycho trick-casting and deceptive plot devices to disguise indifference to its characters’ moral crises.

Soderbergh is callous about “the culture,” offering an insincere money and class critique as shallow as his underlit videography. Hill’s critique is inherent in the efficacy and splendor of his action and montage. Fanboys raised on CGI won’t notice the difference, but true movie lovers will thrill to it (and to dialogue like “You had me at ‘Fuck you’”—beat that, Tarantino).

Soderbergh replaces the topical, medical subject of Nick Ray’s Bigger Than Life with nihilistic cynicism while Hill explores post-9/11 ideas of conflicted morality: Stallone gives a new iconic performance as a man at odds with the law, and Hill distills his story in the most exuberant American kinetics of the past few years.

If Side Effects is Soderbergh’s last film (as promised), give him an urgent farewell. Bullet to the Head’s excitement inspires a “welcome back” for Hill.

Whatever Tatum knows about working-class ambition and exploitation (personal or Hollywood style) gets lost in director Steven Soderbergh’s affectless look at Mike Lane (Tatum), a multitasking, self-described entrepreneur (“It’s French,” he says) who spends most of his time humping-and-grinding at Tampa’s Xquisite Club that specializes in male strip shows for female customers.

Soderbergh emphasizes the strip show, intro’d by club owner Dallas (Matthew McConaughey), a lizardy, leathery All-American huckster. But Soderbergh isn’t interested in eroticism. The sex-as-labor theme is itself exploited and trivialized in the Xquisite performances. Soderbergh shoots the routines (“It’s Raining Men” features the troupe in raincoats, suggestively stroking umbrellas) with the same slicked-up stylization that made Flashdance so phony–and yet made it a hit that set the sentimental template for the next several generations’ fuzzy ideas about egoism and success.

Magic Mike extends that sex/success fantasy with over-seriousness, misrepresenting Mike’s peculiar route toward his goal of making custom-designed furniture! If anything can be said with certainty in this life it’s that people who want to make furniture don’t become sex-workers. That term fits Soderbergh’s low-level shots of dollar-bills-in-thongs–a laughable Bresson affectation. But Magic Mike isn’t an analysis of leisure-as-work like Godard cinched in his capitalism/prostitution allegories A Married Woman or 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her(which were also insightful essays on contemporary Paris). Soderbergh slogs through backstage clichés: Mike struggling against a status-rigged banking system and his doomed mentoring of Adam (Alex Pettyfer), a naïve, unmotivated, emotionally unstable 19-year-old spoiling to be despoiled.

While avoiding the overblown existentialism of P.T. Anderson’s Boogie Nights, Soderbergh’s still arty. His oblique close-up of a dancer using a vacuum penis-pump pretends to be austere but it’s really just another example of Soderbergh’s strange detachment: he’s always distant from his subjects yet gives no perspective. Mike’s attraction to Adam’s motherly sister Brooke (Cody Horn) is as clichéd as the bits from Flashdance, 42nd Street, Showgirls and Saturday Night Fever although Soderbergh avoids their emotional payoffs. His drabness prevents dramatic satisfaction which ultimately prevents comprehension.

In Magic Mike, Channing Tatum trades-in his experience as stripper, dancer, actor for Hollywood glibness. Soderbergh seems uninterested in contemplating male sexuality (Tatum’s body) or the work of performance and public interaction–the things Ice Cube got superlatively right in his 1998 female-stripper movie The Player’s Club. This film is even more aggressively hetero. Among the gallery of specimen from pretty-boy Pettyfer to studly Joe Manganiello and the briefly exoticized Adam Rodriguez, Tatum’s charismatic athleticism is the most inviting. He’s open and energetic unlike his gloomy, introspective muse-characterizations for the urban poet Dito Montiel, yet Soderbergh’s disingenuousness encourages the self-defeating (so far) Hollywood stardom Tatum escaped his roots to accept.

Tatum’s Southern white boy essence and dancer’s eagerness could provide insight about the discipline of break-dancing culture, the working-class ambition and sexual currency of his pre-Hollywood years. But Mike’s glib soliloquies (“I’m not my goddam job!”) offer only recession-ready delusions. So does McConaghay’s impresario, a decadent business figure whose Dennis Hopper-craziness (“Fuck that mirror like you mean it!”) contrasts Mike’s magical innocence. Like the working-class slugs in Soderbergh’s 2005 abomination Bubble, all these characters are shallow. They strip to reveal nothing–despite Tatum’s promise of new physical truths. Dumb hunk stereotype confirmed.

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It’s the combination of “smart” (Soderbergh’s anti-hero rattles off interior monologues full of factoids and facetious observations) with “cynical” (Moore relates plant closures with private home foreclosures) that limits the insights either movie could offer. Instead of researching original information that might speak for itself, Moore editorializes. He pushes situations for gallows humor—which is merely a judgmental reflex. Instead of clear, dramatic presentation of Whitacre’s actual and psychological background,

Michael Moore: king of the ambush-and-blame method.

Soderbergh endorses the man’s warped, subjective point-of-view. (“So there,” goes the film’s opening disclaimer.) He forces the audience to share Whitacre’s self-delusion as if to implicate viewers in Whitacre’s crime. It’s the presumptuousness of Moore and Soderbergh’s approaches that is offensive. Neither film is as sophisticated as Next Day Air, where Mos Def joked, “This is America, steal something!”

Beneath the supposed satire of The Informant and Capitalism lay a smug satisfaction and secret admiration for American corruption. Where would Moore be without it? His tendency to sentimentalize economic plight (visiting the space that once housed the auto plant where his retired father worked) while demonizing those who enjoy economic benefits is too simplistic. It doesn’t risk understanding that losers and winners share the same dream based on a particular ideology—a love of wealth and materialism. That means Capitalism is useless as a guide to understanding what capitalism actually means to Americans.

Fidelity to capitalism wouldn’t necessarily scare off viewers; Soderbergh banks on it in his Oceans franchise—those embarrassingly popular celebrations of dishonesty, greed and thievery. But the “smartness” of The Informant! pretends disapproval of Whitacre’s fraudulence while making it feel like some kind of spree. (Marvin Hamlisch provides a cheery, mock-’70s score meant to evoke the con-game of The Sting. It’s the most sickening movie music since Juno.)

What’s really happening in these “smart” and “cynical” movies is class warfare: Enormously wealthy filmmakers take pious issue with how others make their money. Moore’s ambush-and-blame methods are bad journalism. His lack of moral, political context is as questionable as ever. Soderbergh’s jaundice is almost palpable. The Informant!’s color scheme—hotel-lobby beige and living-room orange, both video-blurry—is sarcastically bland. The film’s fake-neutral tone can’t disguise contempt for its Midwestern-American setting. Soderbergh thinks it’s funny to laugh at the mundane—even though a genuinely perceptive filmmaker like Mike Judge based Office Space’s rich observations in just such a setting.

It’s no coincidence that Matt Damon’s straight-faced buffoon characterization (girth, moustache and eyeglasses) resembles Stephen Root in Office Space. But Root’s anomic drone Milton Waddams was a loser, Damon’s smart-aleck Whitacre hits the jackpot like the Oceans gang. He simultaneously represents American crime and banality (constantly lying to his co-workers, the FBI, his wife, while stashing millions in loot). Equally banal is Whitacre’s “smartness”: a trained biochemist, he rattles off pieces of information like an overeducated idiot. He pathologically points out what’s wrong with America (“Basically everyone in this country is a victim of corporate crime before they finish breakfast.”) yet profits from it.

Like Moore’s more-of-the-same muckraking, Soderbergh is into some strange form of “smart and cynical” entertainment. There’s no humanity to relate to, no wit to laugh at, only chuckling at one’s own sense of superiority—if you can afford it. Both The Informant! and Capitalism: A Love Story would be a little less obnoxious had they switched titles.

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Capitalism:A Love Story
Directed by Michael Moore
Runtime: 105 min.

The Informant!
Directed by Steven Soderbergh
Runtime: 108 min.

High-priced call girl Chelsea (Sasha Grey) promises customers on-the-meter intimacy of the film’s title. Chelsea’s name is an alias, which intentionally evokes the big-money, gallery-choked section of Manhattan. Her “committed” relationship with possibly gay physical trainer Chris (Chris Santos) illustrates the chasm between money and love. (This conveniently coincided with early news of the economic recession during the film’s production.) For a semi-documentary approach, like his similarly morose Bubble, Soderbergh cast porn performer Grey (she doesn’t earn the tag “actress”) plus other non-thespians (including writer Mark Jacobson, who’s shown interviewing Chelsea) as if realistically catching contemporary professional types in this moment of moral and financial reckoning. It’s a millennial dirge for people who don’t know the spiritual/materialist crisis Godard predicted in Nouvelle Vague.

Thankfully, a film version of Noel Coward’s Easy Virtue, about a globetrotting American girl who opposes the hypocrisy of the British class system, also opens this week. Its buoyancy exposes Soderbergh’s scornful, puritanical pretenses: Proto-feminist winner of the Monte Carlo Grand Prix, Larita (Jessica Biel) affects people differently than Chelsea. Chatty Larita has exotic energy. “She looks like money!” the Brits gasp. Biel’s warmth and sexy Yankee strut naturally challenge Old European aristocracy whereas Chelsea/Grey’s impassivity dulls Soderbergh’s already-false critique.

Scrutinizing fast-lane Wall Streeters rather than Grey’s porn industry is a dodge. The A-list restaurants and shops on view resemble the glitzy, high-roller luxe of Soderbergh’s star-packed Ocean’s Eleven franchise, yet this star-deprived indie scolds what Soderbergh celebrates with his elite friends. Girlfriend replays Oceans emphasizing its Hollywood-sleaze essence. It dissolves the distance between the studios and their banks into Chelsea and Chris angling for bigger scores, richer customers—while deceiving each other. Without sustainable skills or definite aspirations, they’re not just money-hungry, they’re money-frantic. Soderbergh may secretly despise the industry’s venality but only half admits it. It turns him on.

In Easy Virtue, director Stephan Elliott challenges the status quo in a more complex way. He depicts the aristocratic Whittaker family’s decline after the Great War when Larita’s sudden marriage into the clan disrupts their staunchness. Larita embodies the post-war, 1920s flapper spirit of renewal—riding a motorcycle through their foxhunt and bringing new literature (Lawrence, Proust and Fitzgerald’s The Beautiful and the Damned) into the manse. Elliott, who made Priscilla, Queen of the Desert and the brilliant meta-operetta Welcome to Woop-Woop, tends toward camp, yet respects Coward’s light sentiment (and pays homage to Ealing Studios’ genteel tradition). Larita reveals her straightforward need for love—her double-layered “easy virtue”—derives from tragic experience. (Chelsea has no background; she’s another conveniently unrooted indie heroine.) Larita’s confession gives the comedy depth; not madcap, she’s direct and sincere. This role measures Biel’s charm against her skill—a modern manifestation of Eleanor Parker’s emotional amplitude.

Elliott surrounds Biel’s slightly anachronistic qualities with odd jazz-era arrangements of “Car Wash” and “Sex Bomb” as if remaking Moulin Rouge. But that error (the film’s only fault) isn’t as disastrous as high-art posturing. Soderbergh’s “genius” conceits (digital burn-out, unfocused close-ups) never work—except for the smart-about-movies crowd that applauds his self-aware, anti-pleasure aesthetic. Instead of credibly dramatizing today’s Eliot Spitzer ethos, Soderbergh’s plot is fragmented then grudgingly resolved. Such art-perversity doesn’t mean Soderbergh is not a hack; operating as his own (improved) cinematographer, he imitates Godard’s 1990s silhouettes and high-relief sound mixes. This chic design is like a magazine layout, not a movie. Lacking Godard’s spiritual yearning and emotion-filled tone makes Soderbergh an art-hack.

Godard frequently used “prostitution” to reveal society’s dehumanization (and his own erotic, capitalist ambivalence—A Married Woman, My Life to Live, 2 or 3 Things). Soderbergh belittles dim-bulbs Chelsea and Chris by casting hooker-performers who show no inner life. Their big breakup pits bad-acting against non-acting—unlike John Cameron Mitchell’s underrated Shortbus, where compassion matched its sexual boldness. Soderbergh’s recession porn confuses drama and documentary without achieving the penetration of art nor the inquiry of journalism. What’s left is acrimony for people who dine at Zeitzeff, Balthazar and Craftsteak like he does.

Turns out Soderbergh is more like Woody Allen than we knew. He even savages the critics who have sucked up to him: Chelsea abhors a john who runs Soderbergh’s semi-doc conceit offers this slander as probable truth. He misuses cinema-verité for sniping. Only those who have personally encountered Glenn Kenny can say whether he deserves being preserved in an oafish, Shrek-like performance. There’s no indication that Ms. Grey or Glenn Kenny understand they’ve been horribly used. Shame, Mr. Soderbergh.
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The Girlfriend Experience
Directed by Steven Soderbergh
Runtime: 78 min.

Easy Virtue
Directed by Stephan Elliott
Runtime: 93 min.

Out-perversing Gus Van Sant’s Milk, Soderbergh makes a four-hour-plus biopic about a historical figure without providing a glimmer of charm or narrative coherence. One can’t accuse Soderbergh of pandering to feel-good piety because Che proudly resists sentimentality about people’s power, distribution of wealth, Marxist theology, radical chic or morbid celebrity. Soderbergh glosses all that, yet still wins Leftist critical acclaim (and a Cannes Best Actor prize for Del Toro’s inexpressive performance) because Che—dead or deadening—remains a politically correct icon.

Benicio del Toro goes for Oscar with his portrayal of the famous revolutionary in Soderbergh’s Che.

It requires some new kind of orneriness to take Che’s famous image (saintly pose in beret with a star or sexy pose with a cheroot hanging from his lip) and continuously alienate an audience from what it represents. Che’s two halves are divided between his international fame exporting the Cuban revolution (speaking at the U.N., meeting the press) and then his Bolivian sojourn in late 1960s. Time-jumping meta-narrative contrasted with a de-centered guerrilla war semi-doc. Both halves defy absolute comprehension. Sequences are designed to prevent emotional involvement; part one is projected at 1.85 aspect ratio, part two at 1.66. This obstinate artiness resembles a Lars Von Trier scam; sure enough, each half opens with long map montages, emulating the interstitial montages of Von Trier’s Breaking the Waves—not a good sign.

In Spain Rodriguez’s new comic-book novel, Che: A Graphic Biography (Verso), a poignant narrative interruption recounts Rodriguez’s own memory of living through the Cuban missile crisis. It makes Che’s significance personal and immediate. Soderbergh doesn’t bother; he’s above the personal revelations of Latin American political drama as risked by Alex Cox’s Walker and Pontecorvo’s Burn. Neither rabble-rousing politician, humanist historian or trailblazing artiste, Soderbergh’s a Pseud.
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Che
Directed by Steven Soderbergh, Running Time: 257 min.
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