Editor’s Warning – I’m telling you now. This review has spoilers. It does not fuck around. It does not pull punches. I got about 2 lines into it before I was like “no way. spoilers. everywhere.” and I do NOT want to ruin this experience for myself. When I one day have it. In a magical world called Never. But luckily, our own Noel Nocciolo was incredible enough to dig down deep and write this up for you all…
When Sex And The City aired originally on HBO, I was in college in New York City. Looking back, the series provided major memories for me, both good and bad. It seemed fitting that I attend the 12:01 a.m. screening on opening night, with Rachel, a close friend from college, at the movie theatre within walking distance from where we went to school. Granted, the theatre is on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, hotbed of the kind of people who make up the target demographic, but it was still shocking to see that we weren’t the only ones who got there with much (two hours) to spare, to snag our six seats together in the back of the theatre. The crowd was a sea of twenty and thirty-something New York women and the gay men who love them, and Rachel’s Mom, Shira, Nate, Rachel’s boyfriend, and Andrew, our friend, who proudly represented the straight male sub-group in the crowd of rabid ‘Sex’ fans.
I warn you, Do NOT see this movie in the theatre unless you were a fan of the show. It’s not worth your (in our case, a few days’ advance purchase price of twelve dollars; everything is more expensive in New York) money if you didn’t have investment in the lives of these four women. I can imagine the movie, in its two hours and thirty minutes, would suck your brain into designer vapid-ness unless you actually really cared. I cared, and I was still caught thinking about how many outfits, shoes, accessories and product placement went into the movie.
I’m going to have to see it again, by myself, in the middle of the afternoon on a weekday, a few weeks from now. For the present, let me share with you a few likes and dislikes. There will be spoilers, so be sure your girlfriend isn’t reading over your shoulder.
The Men:
STEVE: Sorry, but I’ve never really liked Steve. I know he was written to be this great guy for Type-A-Miranda-The-Harvard-Law-Graduate-Attorney, but there was just something about him that annoyed the living shit out of me during the series. I actually felt badly for him when it was revealed that he and Miranda hadn’t had sex in six months; especially since we had been privy to them having sex, (and a lot of it, as a monogamous couple), during the series. I took my feelings back when he revealed that he had cheated, once, on Miranda. I wished that he would have then faded into the proverbial sunset, but instead, they reconciled through marital counseling, overall forgiveness, and a scene on the Brooklyn Bridge that had one of our straight-male friends weeping. I say…..ok, whatever, Steve.….But sometimes the cheese stands alone.
HARRY: He’s a sweet guy, but don’t expect too much out of him in the movie. Not to sound like an art-school jerk, but if the director gave him ‘objectives’ in which to act, his overall objective in the movie would be “to be really sweet at all times.” Boring, yes, but this has always been a show about the relationships between the four friends.
SMITH: He’s a sweet guy, and gorgeous, but don’t expect to learn anything at all about him other than the fact that he’s now Big In L.A. and has a sweet beachfront mansion in Malibu. He stepped up to the plate the last season of the show in his support for Samantha and her battle with breast cancer. Don’t expect anything else remotely exciting here.
BIG: I Always liked Big over Aidan and The Russian, even if he broke Carrie’s heart (on the series and again, as I discovered, in the movie) and acted like an asshole. (Sorry, feminists everywhere.) Big Problem? (pun intended) How can you expect an audience (mostly female, of course) to be satisfied with a happy ending when two hours earlier, you left your forty-plus-year old, never-been-married intended at the altar (or in this case, the ballroom of the New York Public Library) in bridal couture? Sorry dude, you’ve always had a supporter in me, but WTF? I’m supposed to be psyched when he pulls his head from his ass, when its finally resolved and they have the simple City Hall wedding like they had previously planned? It’s hard to be supportive if, like Carrie said over and over, regarding the day of their wedding, “he couldn’t get out of the car?” To then be ok with the show’s central character getting married, as a happily-ever-after resolve? I’m not ok with this. Please don’t deposit my bare, exposed, backside on fresh cement at the beginning of the film and expect me to still like you at the end.
Things That Caused Me To Raise An Eyebrow:
–What happened to Marcus, Stanford’s Broadway-dancing, Hamptons summer-home co-owning Mensch of a boyfriend? No mention at all. No cameo at all.
–Why did Anthony and Stanford, both bitchy, both obviously not into one another during series, share an awkward New Year’s kiss?
–Who is Jennifer Hudson’s Agent/Manager/Publicist/Personal Fairy-Godmother/Guardian Angel, and how did this person guide Hudson, who looked like she was reading her lines off a teleprompter next to the camera, into a role with so much screen-time next to Sarah Jessica Parker?
–Where was the “Carrie” necklace that had so many scenes in the series?
Things That Made Me Happy The Movie Was Made:
–Charlotte ran away with the film. She, quite literally, poops her pants in Mexico, tells Big off in grand style, and provides the ‘Lioness Protecting Her Cub’ facial expression and loving arms for Carrie when jilted by Big. Way to work it, Kristin Davis.
–Carrie Bradshaw started the series a writer, and ended the series a writer. She provided her signature fly-on-the-wall narrative of her life and the life of her friends. She sat in front of her laptop. She published books. She stayed Carrie.
–Though a total bummer of a “New Years Sadness/Happiness Montage With God-Awful Cover of Auld Lane Syne in the background” we got to see Miranda alone with Chinese food. It brought me back to the gems of scenes in the series when, though cross-town, Miranda and Carrie would share profound phone conversations before bedtime.
–Seeing Samantha stand up for the woman/slut/fierce bitch that she is, in L.A., in New York, in Mexico. We see that she fought breast cancer and came out swinging, and the girls finally revealed/acknowledged her age on the show. (Samantha is 50, in case you were thrown by all the frame-by-frame airbrushing for all four women)
This was a nostalgic two hours and thirty minutes. Though I laughed aloud quite a bit, it was not as funny as it could have been, and heavier, perhaps, than it should have been. This is not Academy-Award winning art, but instead a mark of the end of an era of over-the-top fashion, frankness of sexual encounters and interpersonal relationships between four strong, intelligent women living in the wonderful metropolis of New York City. Carpe Diem.
And now here is our very own Eric Diaz (who you may all know forum-style as Eric AD) with his review of this powerhouse that puts the “jugs” back into the words Box Office Juggernaut. Use the comments below to answer truthfully: Which Sex & The City girl would you go for? You know I’m a coug man so Kim Cattral is in. And the other one (Kristen Davis) that’s not Kerri or the Red Head is cool in my book too. Here’s Eric’s impressions:
For tons of men all over the world, the likes of Iron Man and Indiana Jones were the most anticipated movies of the summer season, but for millions of women and gay men like myself, tt was Sex and the City: The Movie that we were counting down to ( OK, I was counting down to it quite a bit less than the super hero popcorn flicks…I guess even for me, Geek trumps Gay. But it was close! ) For those few who don’t know, the show was about four women in their thirties and forties in Manhattan and their various sexual and romantic adventures. There’s nympho forty – ish ad exec Samantha Jones, ( Kim Cattral ) acerbic lawyer Miranda Hobbs ( Cynthia Nixon ), prudish Charlotte York, ( Kristen Davis ) and at the center of it all, sex columnist Carrie Bradshaw played by Sarah Jessica Parker.
Much of the show’s drama unfolded around Carrie’s on again/ off again relationship with the elusive “Mr Big” played by Chris Noth, as well as several other men in between. When Sex premiered on HBO back in 1998, there had never been anything like it before. Here were women who talked about sex the same way men do, who were accomplished and witty and not just the sidearm to the male characters. Single urban women all over the country embraced the show as theirs, and gay men realized that at least on occasion, some of these women were really gay men in disguise ( no doubt because the show’s creator and at least two head writers were gay, including future comic book scribe Allan Heinberg ) the show was an instant pop culture phenomenon, not just among women and gay guys, but a lot of straight men loved it too, or at least pretended to back when it was the “It” show.
Now however, four years after Sex and the City went off the air, straight men act like it’s the bane of their existence…like watching the show will make their dicks fall off or something. It’s lumped in with “chick shows” like the stuff they show on the Lifetime Network. But I don’t think any of those shows ever had women talk about whether or not they should make their man take wheat grass shots to make their semen taste better. Or whether or not they should shave their pussies into cute little shapes to please their fellas, or the politics of letting someone pee on you in the shower. I’ve always detected the stench of misogyny whenever a guy greatly dislikes this show, as if women can only be sexual if A: Men are the ones doing the sexualizing or B: The women are ridiculously hot in a non real way and under the age of 25. How any guy could dislike a show that encouraged a whole generation of girls to casual sex is beyond me. Of course, I will give some men the benefit of the doubt if their only exposure to the show has been in it’s greatly neutered syndication run. Every time I chance upon a rerun of the show on TBS or something I cringe. It reminds me of the TV edits of The Breakfast Club when I was a kid, and I get flashbacks to Judd Nelson yelling “Fail You!” instead of just saying “Fuck You” to the Principal. What’s the point? The crassness is a great part of the show’s charm…without it, it’s not really the same show.
But as much as I love the show, I have to admit I kind of hated how the series ended. For all the ridiculousness of the sexcapades on the show, it actually was pretty realistic in it’s portrayal of relationships. So when the notoriously non committal and frankly kind of selfish “Mr. Big” suddenly decides to change his ways and sweep Carrie Bradshaw off her feet in a fairy tale ending….I secretly hated it. All the women of America gushed, bet as a viewer I kind of felt betrayed. Whatever it might have been, Sex and the City never fed their viewers that kind of bullshit before. After spending six years telling their mostly female audience that it’s ok to be single, even if your are in your thirties, and not to settle for some asshole just in an effort not to be alone, the show kind of betrayed it’s own premise.
So I was prepared for the worst when they announced the movie. The trailer didn’t help either; it looked sappy and hokey, and worst of all neutered, as if it was trying to cater to all the fans that only discovered the show via it’s virtually sex-less syndication run ( In other words: Your Mom ) Not to mention, reunions are more often than not at least somewhat disappointing, missing that certain something that the ensemble had before. Sure, I missed the girls, but thanks to the magic of DVD, they had never really gone away for me. Did I, or the world, really need a Sex and the City Movie??
Well, no…probably not. But I’m sure glad we got one anyway. Sex and the City is not a great film, or really even a film in the traditional sense. It’s essentially 4 or 5 episodes strung along to a 2 1/2 hour running time. Nothing is structurally changed from the way the show was written or shot or acted, except maybe the title credits. But while Sex may not have been a great film, what it was was the Series Finale I wanted four years ago and didn’t get. Instead of everything being tied up in a nice convenient bow at the end, the movie actually shows that fairy tale endings are indeed bullshit…but that doesn’t mean that the ending has to be an unhappy one either. The ensemble never misses a beat, and their chemistry is there like it was just yesterday that the show wrapped. The one fear I did have however, that the big screen version proved to be a more neutered version of the show proved to be totally true. There was very little Sex in this particular City, even from stalwart Samantha, who you could always count on for at least one raunchy scene. Or three. And the addition of Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson to the ensemble as Carrie’s new assistant is kind of pointless. She’s not around long enough in the movie to really become “one of the girls” and her whole role could have been easily filled by say, Charlotte, who had the least amount of screen time of the four women. And while the TV show was famous for name dropping labels, the move takes it to a whole new level. But whatever, these are really minor quibbles for me. It was great to see the girls again, and if this is the last time we see the four of them together, then I’m ok with that. I think it’s best to go out leaving people wanting more, and that’s just what Sex and the City does so well.