Steven Soderbergh directs, shoots and edits from a screenplay credited to Brian Koppelman and David Levien (“Rounders,” “Ocean’s 13”) that feels at times like an op-ed piece, in other places like occupational sociology, or like an investigative profile. But it’s mostly a fictional study of a young woman negotiating workplace and selfhood in Manhattan. Chelsea (Sasha Grey, a notorious young adult-film star making her non-adult film debut) is a self-employed escort living with her boyfriend who works as a personal trainer. He’s played by Chris Santos, a triathlete making his debut as well. Set across five days in October 2008, “The Girlfriend Experience” includes a lot of talk about the economy and upcoming presidential election. Chelsea, who uses a numerological self-help book on “personology” to govern her decisions on clients, narrates a diary of her work life by listing the labels on her high-end threads, shoes and bags. This interests a journalist played by journalist Mark Jacobson (in his first onscreen role). Earlier, Jacobson’s real-world reporting supplied the stories for the screenwriters of “The Believer” and “American Gangster.” In a string of lunch appointments, he interviews Chelsea for a magazine article about “the girlfriend experience” she supplies her clients. But full disclosure for this non-client is beyond her introspective talents. She cannot deliver “the interview experience” for a man who observes of the other men who buy her more than lunch: “If they wanted you to be yourself, they wouldn’t be paying you.” The plot includes two trips: one to Vegas that her boyfriend takes as a guest of a hedge-fund manager he’s training, and one she takes to an upstate resort with a new man in her life. But Soderbergh’s trip is into our fiscal psyche—he labels this “the age of post-crisis capitalism”—not a foray into erotic terrain. “Sasha has a huge appetite for sex and self-exploration,” state the press notes, where her recent awards as a performer include Best Three-Way Sex Scene and Best Oral Sex Scene. Those talents are not employed in this incisive, if non-explicit film that is unrated by the MPAA. With Peter Zizzo, Timothy J. Cox and contentious film blogger Glenn Kenny in a filthy scene-stealer. 77m. (Bill Stamets)
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