Yes, No, Maybe So: "Magic Mike"

One of this year's true novelty pictures will likely be Steven Soderbergh's Magic Mike. It's at least partially based on star Channing Tatum's own experiences as a male stripper pre film stardom and there are very few male stars of his magnitude that would so willfully go there. We hope the film is as much of a novelty in execution as it sounds in concept. (When's the last time someone made a mainstream male stripper movie? 1983?!?) Let's give it the Yes No Maybe So treatment even if we were already "Yes" when it was less a movie in production and more of a rumor called  Channing Tatum Wants to Make A Movie About His Own Life As a Stripper. 

'Magic. Mike.' You are the husband that they never had. You are the dreamboat guy that never came along."

YES

• The trailer begins almost giddily by embracing the oldest stripping cliche -- it's the ol' legit man in uniform is cheekily anything but legit. And he's also soon out of uniform. more yes (and a little no maybe so after the jump)

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Say What, Magic Mike (and Matthew)?

Amuse us. Add dialogue or a caption to this new still from Magic Mike.

another new (more strip-tastic) still after the jump...

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We Should Read "The Paperboy"

Herewith a few notes on the newly released poster for The Paperboy which looks good enough to... read. The movie is about a reporter (Matthew McConaughey) and his troubled brother (Zac Efron) investigating a death row inmate (John Cusack) who is involved in a steamy correspondence with a femme fatale (Nicole Kidman).

Is Zac Efron sending me a personal message by working with La Pfeiffer & Nic' back to back? 

        [plugs ears] lalalalalalalala ican'thearyou

I was once a paperboy. It's true. For years! Paperboys have gone the way of the milk man but when I was a kid this was a common job for suburban boys and girls to have. Then you'd do your collecting and spend all your hard-earned quarters at the arcade.

Nicole Kidman looks trashy delishusssss. Love the lusty smirk, like she's going to eat Zac right up --  not for his pleasure (!) but just to wield her own sexual power. Billing is always an interesting matter. If you can't be first, be last. Or rather "AND..." last. So Matthew & Nic' win.

Speaking of billing... I find it kind of interesting that the poster preferences the novelist and screenwriter above the Oscar nominated Lee Daniels (Precious) like it's a subliminal reminder of how great Precious was. Implied titles  The Paperboy: Based on the Novel "The Paperboy" by Pete Dexter.

I think the color scheme is really helping. It's like the movie is summertime hot but someone left the paperback on the beach and it got all washed out. The retro craze for teaser posters is really on, isn't it? Just like the retro craze is really on onscreen (at least three of the Best Picture hopefuls). I suppose ANYTHING is better than dread contemporary poster aesthetics: big floating movie star heads or those imagination-prison horizontal stripes. This poster manages to include all the stars (if that's McConaughey out of focus but I can never recognize him with his shirt on) without resorting to the stripes at all. Well, except for that last insert of John Cusack's threatening eyeliner. But even that plays like a fun "to be continued" comic book panel.

If the movie is as good as this poster, I shall write it steamy letters from my apartment prison.

I think we should read the novel while we wait for this because you know Lee Daniels isn't a copy & paste kind of director but someone who likes to play with visuals.  Who is with me? If so, say so... we need lots of blog projects to do it up real big like for 2012 before the apocalypse.

"Say, you need a ride?"

Listen you outta ditch the two geeks you're in the car with now and get in with us but that's all right, we'll worry about that later. I will see you there."

Beauty Break: The Cast of "Magic Mike"

Channing Tatum: The Early YearsSteven Soderbergh's Magic Mike, must be nearing cameras, since casting news is dropping regularly now. No one can ever claim that Soderbergh dawdles... though wasn't he supposed to be retiring? He seems awfully busy for someone winding down. The film is a pet project of Channing Tatum's and loosely based on his experience as a stripper at 19. He had never hidden his body as cash machine past (see also: much modelling) so the surfacing of that video a couple years back was more novelty than scandal. 2012 is going to be a huge year for Tatum as he has not one not two but five movies that'll be hitting theaters.

Channing plays the title character of Magic Mike and will school rising star Alex Pettyfer (of I Am Number Four)  on the fine art of hustling. Earlier this week we heard that Matthew McConaughey had joined the film as their pimp boss and just last night news came that White Collar's Matt Bomer has also signed on. I've never watched an episode of White Collar but I've watched several episodes of Bomer photographs (His fans be feverish with the posting of them, you know). TWO MORE ANNOUNCED: True Blood's Joseph Mangianello also added to the cast as "Big Dick Richie" and now Cuban model/actor William Levy update again (08/29) Levy has turned down the role. Bad move. He's not famous and this is a major director we're talking about with a starry cast.

Other rumored members of the cast include Shiloh Fernandez and Demi Moore (!!!) who, well, ⇒⇒⇒

I'm not sure I believe either rumor -- especially the Demi one. But if it's true, I guess Soderbergh isn't superstitious about invoking the ghost of infamous bad-movie Striptease (1996)!

Care to help Soderbergh out with the rest of the casting? Who should join Pettyfer, Bomer, Levy, Manganiello, McConaughey and Tatum in bum-shaking and tip-taking?

Poor Johnathon Schaech. Anyone remember him from the 90s? Wasn't he supposed to star in (or wanted to star in) a Chippendales movie? It never happened but he's still working and still beautiful at 42. So come on Soderbergh, isn't there room for a middle manager or a McConaughey rival?

Tatum, Pettyfer, McConaughey, Bomer, Fernandez

Striptastic photos of the cast after the jump... (if you're into that. if you aren't don't go clicking)

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