Steven Soderbergh’s latest film in faux Indie style about a Manhattan call girl (played by the already infamous Sasha Grey) and her über ambitious roommate (Chris Santos) is, by turns, engaging, tedious, and, ultimately, as empty as the lifestyle it portrays. A real documentary about NYC callgirls would have been more interesting, but, of course, this would have required more than a few weeks of Mr. Soderbergh’s time. Still, there is something memorable about the film. The person I saw the film with said it was Sasha Grey’s eyebrows, but then she didn’t like either Ms. Grey or the film. For me, it was the simultaneously spare and sumptuous, completely nonjudgmental portrait of a member of the New York demimonde, who spends as much time interviewing her clients and marketing herself as she spends in bed. Despite everything that has been written about Sasha Grey, both positive and negative, she embodies this young prostitute in an American Psycho kind of way, right down to naming the brands of her designer underwear. I personally don’t think the film is as iconic as some reviewers have suggested (the new incarnation of Godard, blah, blah, blah), but it’s definitely worth a see.

Che Part 1 is Steven Soderbergh’s attempt to create an historically accurate picture of Che Guevara’s role in the Cuban Revolution, which, if you think about it, was one of the most unexpected events of the last century, since it took place under the noses of the Americans less than a hundred miles away. Soderbergh frames the film from the perspective of Guevara’s appearance at the United Nations after the revolution. We see Che, Fidel, and the others in long flashbacks as they plot, fight, and, ultimately, win the war against Batista’s army. Soderbergh said he wanted to show Che “just as he was.” Benicio del Toro’s portrayal of the asthmatic Che is wonderfully understated, and Demián Bichir’s Fidel Castro is laugh-out-loud funny, though I’m sure he’s not intended to be. Because Che is being interviewed in New York as the events in Cuba take place in flashbacks (Soderbergh’s framing device), we hear Che’s actual words about revolution and other topics. I found the film interesting, though a bit clunky. I especially liked the fact that Soderbergh chose not to be politically correct, as Oliver Stone seems to have become in his later years. There is no doubt that American imperialism is the enemy.