Magnolia Pictures has released the trailer for Steven Soderbergh’s The Girlfriend Experience. The film stars adult actress Sasha Grey (in her first mainstream film). Check it out after the jump via Hulu.

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By Jordan Raup

I’ll admit it. I’ve never heard of Watchmen until Zack Snyder was attached to direct during the summer of 2006. Since I hadn’t read the graphic novel the hype started when I saw the trailer before The Dark Knight. I knew it was something special and after reading the graphic novel during the past couple months my hype increased tenfold. After the lawsuit fiasco got resolved it finally sunk in, I would actually be seeing this very soon. Only watching the trailers and select TV spots, the day finally arrived. From the first frame of Watchmen, as lush yellow completely engulfs the screen while the company logos pop in, eventually fading into that iconic pin, we just hope Snyder doesn’t screw this up. Don’t worry, he doesn’t.

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By Dan Mecca

Sporting a familiar story in a familiar city, writer/director Gary King’s indie film New York Lately is a very comfortable affair. Most reminiscent of Edward Burns’ Sidewalks of New York, King’s film does not offer much that is new in the way of multi-character examination within the construct of New York City, but that is more of a compliment than a criticism. King appears to know this construct-it looks as though he’s seen every “NYC film” from Manhattan to Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist.

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MTV held a preview screening of Watchmen for some 300 viewers recently. Director Zack Snyder did a Q and A after and VH1 was there to report it. Check it out below:

“The director’s cut is three hours and 10 minutes and comes out in July,” Snyder revealed, calling his original edit “considerably more violent than this … and sexier” and explaining that if the movie does well, the director’s cut will get a theatrical release in Los Angeles and New York.

Following that, of course, will be the Watchmen DVD in the fall – which will include what he dubbed a “Crazy Ultimate Freaky Edition” boasting such time-omitted extras as Tales of the Black Freighter, Hollis Mason’s death, more Manhattan moments on Mars and dialogue-heavy scenes with the newsstand-bonding Bernies.

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By Dan Mecca

There may be nothing sadder than the life of the average independent film. Every year thousands are made for pennies when put next to even one summer blockbuster. And every year some of them are good enough to run the film festival circuit. Among that batch, a handful get picked up and distributed by film companies.

…Around, written and directed by David Spaltro, is the embodiment of the independent film, and a very fine example of one at that. Made for around $175,000 dollars, most of it swiped on some 40 of Spaltro’s credit cards, the fact that this “little” film even got made is an accomplishment. The story is told, and lived, by a young man named Doyle, played by Rob Evans, an extremely talented young actor who’s uncanny resemblance to actor Ryan Gosling only helps, as he is in most every frame.

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By Dan Mecca

During a recession, a paranoid political thriller in which the bad guy is a debt-collecting international bank seems like an easy sell. Unfortunately, The International never takes the time to figure out what exactly it’s trying to say or how exactly it’s trying to say it. Although directed by the perennially-promising Tom Tykwer, the German director who gave us Run, Lola, Run over a decade ago, the film was doomed to fail, first and foremost, on the printed page. Written by first-timer Eric Warren Singer, the BIG messages rampant throughout the plot of this thing are as ambitious as they are convoluted, and it appears there was nothing Tykwer could do to distract viewers from this fact. There are no small lines in this film, just large lines comprised of altruisms that sound like the worst version of Robert Frost (“Sometimes a man meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it”).

Clive Owen stars as Louis Salinger, an Interpol agent bent on taking down IBBC, an evil multi-national bank with countless ties to terrorists, bombs and the like. The poorly cast, or simply under-utilized, Naomi Watts stars as Eleanor Whitman, a Manhattan D.A. also bent on taking down IBBC. There is literally nothing else about her character established – oh wait, she has a family, so I guess that was Singer’s sympathy angle.

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