Sex And The City Film Review – An uneasy feeling (good, but not great)
A review of the Sex And The City by one of the only men in the audience.
The ladies were all excited, egging each other on, feeling liberated when they came into the cinema. They were still excited when they left, but perhaps a little less. They seemed to be thinking about it, and contemplating what they'd say when asked. They liked it, they enjoyed it. They thought it was good. They laughed, they cried, but there was also something else: they couldn't quite put their finger on it.
If you are a Sex and the city fan, you're going to see the movie anyway, whatever reviewers say. You've been watching the TV show for years and you feel part of the family. The good news is that you'll feel that it was worth your while. It ticks boxes, it has clever scripting, there are highs and lows and emotional moments. There are fashion in-jokes, and nod-nod-wink-wink back-references (including a Cynthia Nixon scene with a lesbian gag).
Some things you may notice while watching the Sex And the City movie:
- There's a lot of product placement.
- Gravity seems to have done some bad things to Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) and Smith (Jason Lewis) who both look like they've aged a lot and lost their glamour. Steve (David Eigenberg) is ten times scruffier than before, while in contrast Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Charlotte (Kristin Davis) and Samantha (Kim Cattrall) all stayed as hot as they were to begin with and, at times, hotter.
- If you're a man (or a woman who's not greatly into fashion), you'll feel that there's too much of 'let's put our heroines in as many outfits as possible and show you lots of brand fashion' - although Sex And the City was always big on fashion, it was never so pronounced, prolonged and in your face. Too prolonged for non-fashionistas. Even though, as a man, I did actually like the TV show, the film told me to my face that I blatantly wasn't the target audience.
The verdict: I enjoyed a lot of it, but got a sense that many in the audience expected an uplifting experience and instead got a bit of an uneasy undertone in the plot. It was almost as if the bitter message was wrapped in the feelgood and cleverness, and therefore wasn't easy to detect - but underneath the surface it bubbled, and nagged you as you watched. In the Sex And The City series, even when bad things happened to the characters, there was always a thread of optimistic 'we're not taking ourselves all that seriously' woven in at the right places. Hard lessons ended in comparisons to shoes and Fendi bags. The movie, in contrast, felt like it was bearing the brunt of the responsibility to be a proper feature. The finality was not feel-good, it was more of a "thank-god it ended well, but actually, is this ending a good one?".
Hey, but you'll go anyway... And if you drag your heterosexual boyfriends with you, be sure they know it isn't meant for them, and that you'll reward them handsomely for going: a nice drill set would do.
Official Sex and The City Movie Trailer: