Movie Review: GFE

May 24, 2009, 9:04 PM

I abbreviated the movie title, it should be "The Girlfriend Experience". The movie is about a high dollar escort working some high dollar clients in New York City in the five days before the 2008 elections. The first half hour of this movie was like watching Wall Street Review, all they did was talk money, blah, blah, blah.

Finally, they got into the meat of the story, but the movie's timelines are all over the place. It's an "experimental movie". This kind of timeline all over the place finally makes sense near the end, but as a writer, I feel the movie actually would've been better had it been linear, and had it not so much dealt with finance.

Sasha Grey, a porn actress, plays the lead character. Don't let this throw you, there's actually only four seconds of nudity, and no sex. Her character, Christine, actually has a serious boyfriend, even though she escorts. The girlfriend experience (GFE) is something some escorts will do. They will go to dinner with you, go on weekend outings, and kiss the client on the lips.

Christine plays it safe, running background checks on her clients, and she lets someone know who she's with, and when. She also walks away from 25,000 offers to go overseas when the junket offered is somewhat fishy. However, when she actually decides to spend an entire weekend with a client she likes as more than a client, the boyfriend has trouble with it.

Sasha provides a performance that should make the young actresses of Hollywood nervous. She displays a wide range of emotions and never once comes across as a porn actress who lucked into a role she doesn't deserve. She is mesmerizing and her on again, off again narrative is the most interesting thing in the movie (it should've been used more).

I give this movie four stars out of five (subtracting a star for the blah blah about finance).

comments (8)

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steve22916 years ago

Glad you enjoyed it, but I couldn't get through it. Your description sounds accurate from what I could tell. They were showing it for free on my DirecTV package, so I recorded it on the DVR to watch later. I got bored a few minutes in with all the blah, blah blah you noted and started fast forwarding to get to the "good" parts, only to find there weren't any. Regarding the GFE referenced in the title, having seen a few of Sasha Gray's videos, the last thing I would want is her kissing me on the mouth!

arbeeguy16 years ago

Living out here in the sticks, I doubt I will ever get to see it in a movie theater, but maybe it will be on Netflix in a few months. Wonder if my wife would enjoy watching it with me. Probably not a good idea cuz it is way out of the normal zone of what she and I watch on Netflix. Mostly G rated oldies or G rated Indy flicks that have gotten good recommendations. Anyway, it is fun to think of Sasha Grey getting into mainline movies. I am sure the prestige, and ultimate potential, is much better. If this one clicks maybe we'll see more non-porn from Sasha. But her porn legacy will never go away -- it's imbedded in the Internet now.

SuperDude16 years ago

Not playing in Detroit, yet. I want to see it based on your review.

samsung116 years ago

You can watch the movie online Amazon.com/videoondemand
it costs $6.99

samsung116 years ago

I thought the movie was worth watching but I admit I had to watch it in two sittings because it did get pretty boring. Nearly every guy she meets to fuck complains about the economy. One of the guys doesn't even fuck her, he just complains about business.

I find it ironic that when the $2,000 per hour escort went to the store she wanted to buy the "cheapest" prepaid phone, haggling with the shop owner over the phone price.

"I'll give you $80 for it" "actually we can't because the cost is $95"..."ok i'll give you $95 and buy two of them." "No, we can't do that. I'll do $100 at the least."

Also this movie illustrates the importance of review websites. In the movie, a blogger wrote a spectacular review for an upcoming escort and she ends up stealing one of Sasha Grey's regulars and becoming the most popular escort. This makes Sasha Grey realize the importance of the blogger because she originally turned him down when he wanted to fuck her and write a review about her. She gets depressed after seeing one of her regulars taken away from a new escort who rose to popularity from the review site. Then at the end she decides the fuck the blogger.

So the two main drama lines are the jealous escort boyfriend who can't stand her going out of town with a client. This client happens to be the client that calls her right before they are suppose to meet and tells her he changes his mind because he wants to be with his family this weekend instead. And second, how bloggers and journalists can build up escorts but also hurt their business with poor reviews. At first Sasha Grey decides to ignore the blogger and thinks he is a loser. But once she realizes how his reviews help a new escort take away some of her business she starts to take him serious.

robofan16 years ago

This movie was on the HDNM channel for free last week so I DVR'ed it. Just got around to watching it last night and all I can say is boring, boring, boring. Almost no nudity or sex just a bunch of boring dialog between an escort and her clients who all bitch how crappy the economy is and how bad their business is doing.

I don't understand why they cast Sasha Grey in the role. With the amount of sex and nudity they could have gotten any Hollywood actress with no problem. Perhaps all the non porn actresses could recognize a bad script when they read it. I thought that Sasha Grey brought nothing to the part. She lacked personality and generated no sympathy for her character. She is not alone though not a single memorable character in the movie.

My advice is pass, skip it, don't rent it. I give it one big yawn.

Dudester16 years ago

It's vitally important that Sasha and this movie succeed. In Hollywood today, there are a number of prudish actresses ( i.e.Natalie Portman, Jessica Alba, etc.) who won't strip for roles (Stripper, porn star) that demand it. Worse, there are gay directors (i.e. Richard Bey) who let them get away with this nonsense.

Thirty years ago, porn films had plots (some old porn movies were quite good actually) and porn actors did crossover (mainstream and porn) roles. It's past time that we cast off the prudish actresses and their gay cohorts in favor of crossover actresses who will play a role with honesty.

The endlessly blah blahing about money was quite tedious, but there was honesty in the moments when she was with her clients. This is one of the most honest films I've ever seen.

how16 years ago

A great director (Welles? Kubrick? I don't remember...) said his movies had elements that "might not be purely honest, but are interesting." I'd rather see interesting entertainment, if the purely honest approach is boring.