There is no denying that Magic Mike XXL is a film about male strippers – or ‘male entertainers’ – but honestly, this film has received such poor judgement and dismissal when it’s actually worth much more.
Yes, there isn’t really a plot line. The story basically follows that the group is reunited to participate in a stripper convention in Florida. There isn’t a crisis point, there is little character development and the only story that we can follow is the slight hints towards a romance blossoming between frontman Mike (Channing Tatum) and Zoe (Amber Heard Depp).
However, Magic Mike XXL has three key points that make it a really good film: it’s sexy, it’s funny, and it’s surprisingly empowering.
Obviously, it’s sexy, as it has its fair share of half-naked men gyrating and flexing. It’s also funny, and I was actually surprised to find myself laughing loudly throughout entire scenes; the writing has the perfect amount of witty dialogue and this combined with the hilariously executed acting – I’m talking about Joe Manganiello’s “Cheetos” scene – makes it all very funny.
The whole basis of this film is the idea that male entertainers need to get rid of these overused performances with Firemen and Sailors, and stop telling women what they should find sexy and instead, actually ask them what they find sexy.
The 5 men are travelling down to the convention when they decide to throw away their costumes and props from the performances they have previously done, and Mike encourages his co-workers to not hide behind a scripted performance and to just aim to make women happy and feel good. For me, this was the turning point of the film that made it so much better than the first Magic Mike.
Throughout the whole film, the female spectators are referred to as ‘queens’ or a ‘goddess’. They are reminded how beautiful and sexy they are by the male entertainers. And, the film shows women of all shapes and sizes and ages being worshipped in this way. It’s great.
The female characters also made this film hugely empowering. All female characters are strong and push boundaries that usually female characters stay within. Zoe shows her independence when she talks about a job offer that she had to reject because she was worried it was offered to her by a guy who wanted to sleep with her, rather than respect her photography.
Andie MacDowell’s character Nancy shows how she pushes these boundaries when she is still interested in sex despite being an older woman and a mother, showing how women still have a libido despite being ‘older’. She encourages her daughters to ‘play the field’ and enjoy being sexually promiscuous.
Jada Pinkett Smith’s character Rome pushes boundaries the most – she is a successful businesswoman who owns a huge mansion and earns money by using male entertainers to make her female customers (“queens”) feel good – “worshipped”, “exalted”. When talking about Rome, Andre says, “Rome wanted a palace… so she built it.” This girl is one we could all look up to.
In a recent interview, Jada said her reasons for doing this film: “Women can engage in these sexually charged environments with mutual respect and exaltation. And I think the idea of trying to infuse that more and more in this industry is something that we should really try to do because it’s going to exist, there’s no eradicating it, you know what I mean? So we can at least try to elevate it, so this was like a shot at that.” And I have to say, I completely agree with her.