Review: Sex and the City Movie

Disclaimer: Let me first admit that I am completely unable to adequately judge this movie based solely on the merits of exceptional filmmaking. I am a fan and can only evaluate how well I think this film will satisfy other fans of the show; to see my complaints about the show, or the premises of it's plot in general, I will direct you to my earlier post, "Sex and the City: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly." What is true about the flaws of the show is mostly true of the flaws in the film.


It's been 4 years and Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha are finally back to discover what happens after "happily ever after" - but this time in a movie! Over the course of 154 minutes, writer/director Michael Patrick King (head writer of the show) has managed to assemble every current important character for a meditation on a potential marriage, a potential divorce, a potential pregnancy and a potential sex drive in which our girls remember that you can always count on your friends, but also that you can't always count on life to come up roses.

The movie initially has a little trouble finding it's footing. Without the usual column voice-over as a guide, the structure of the film feels somewhat discombobulating to a fan of the show and it's format, as if it's struggling to remember which storyline it needs to revisit. (And you don't know how loathe I am to admit that the column structure was actually comforting, not to mention, helpful in pacing). The opening sequence mostly functions as a catch-up guide for the non-show viewer and revisits some nice moments from the series, but overall the first 10 minutes seem overly indulgent in "Hey! I missed you!"/"Hey! My Friends!" moments. But once the film settles into it's story, the frantic rushing from New to L.A. and from one greeting to another slows down.

At 2 and a half hours, the film may seem overlong, but is actually filled with scenes that will thrill fans of the characters and fashion, but that the writers never had the luxury of including in the show's half-hour format. Plotwise, the fashion show in Carrie's closet, the extended montage of wedding dresses and their labels, and the Charlotte/pudding/bowel movement scenario are unnecessary to further the story. But I thought it was fun to revisit Carrie's various wardrobe disasters (the ballerina dress from the credits was a nice shoutout, although I doubt some of those hideous '80's ensembles would have survived the great Carrie/Aidan consolidating move-in of Season 4), and how could a show with such vocal love of fashion pass on an opportunity to display Carrie in a wedding dress by everyone from Christian Lacroix to Vera Wang and Dior?

As for the much discussed plot, after four years of unwedded bliss, Mr. Big and Carrie decide add marriage to their move-in merger, Miranda and Steve deal with waning passion and marital woes, and Samantha deals with a life in L.A. that revolves around her TV-star beau. Only Charlotte, still happily married to the lovable Harry Goldenblatt, with adopted daughter Lily in tow, seems content in her life. After a "sad event" in the first third of the film, Carrie is thrown into a depressed whirlwind and the girls head for a vacation in Mexico to rejuvenate their lagging mojos with renewed female bonding. (And don't jump to crazy conclusions about that "sad event" like I did - Big isn't going to die! Honestly, after you watch the preview, just pick the most logical devastating even that could happen to Carrie. Despite most reviews keeping it a secret, it isn't hard to guess.) Carrie also picks up a new personal assistant, Louise (Jennifer Hudson) to help reorganize her life and remind her what it's like to be a young girl, looking for love in the big city. Hudson is a welcome dose of youthful vigor and sass, but I agree with the critic who thought that 'St. Louise" (as Carrie dubs her) was too saintly; a little flaw wouldn't have hurt.

The conflicts are nothing groundbreaking, but seemed realistic for our girls at this stage in their lives. After finding love and contentment, what comes next? Not a life without problems and after the thousands of romantic comedies that end just when the wedding is over, it is refreshing to watch a romantic comedy that deals with women negotiating happiness in their 40's. And I'll give the movie a hearty "Well Done" for the handling of that "sad event." As obvious as it seems now, this scene was given the weight is needed to push the film into realistic territory. What starts as confusion somehow devolves into tragedy through mistaken intentions, past history and character development, and an absolutely somber take on the situation. I almost gasped. The acting in this scene is heartbreaking and sets a more serious tone for the rest of the film.

For any fan of the show, the movie will really be a chance to revisit old friends and find them as charming, lovable and relatable as ever. The script is no where near as witty or controversial as any best episode of the series, but the lines and reactions are true to character. When Samantha cusses someone out because they interrupt her toast, her lines aren't clever, but they are what Samantha would say. Miranda's sarcastic eye rolls, Sam's painfully bad double entendres, Carrie's childlike squeaks, and Charlotte's optimistic refrains are not the writing of high art, but we smile anyway because we recognize these characters and even their imperfections are comforting. Each actress has a moment to shine: Sarah Jessica Parker pushes Carrie into amazing scenes of anger and hurt and it was nice to see Carrie's legendary self-absorption play a role in her conflict, even if it was not explicitly mentioned. Cynthia Nixon continues to impress me by making Miranda harder and more cynical than ever, but still keeping that heartbreaking vulnerability close to the surface. Samantha's storyline lags in some places, but at least gives Kim Catrall a realistic conflict involving her sex drive and the opportunity to use another facial expression than "sex kitten." Charlotte has the least meat to her storyline, unless you count her miracle "dream come true"-spoiled-in-the-trailer pregnancy. However, this movie almost made her my favorite character despite the more limited screen time. Charlotte has never been high on my list, she's too romantic, naive and cheerleader more of the time, but her intense loyalty to Carrie in this film was absolutely endearing. Kristin Davis has several expressions of pure, vitrolic rage that made me fall head over heels for Charlotte.

My only real complaint is that the men, with the exception of Chris Noth's Mr. Big, were kept mostly in the background. I understand with the limitation of a film, there wasn't room for fleshed out storylines with all of the men, but I love each of them almost as much as the girls, and I missed them. If rumors are true, there may be another film in the works down the line - here's hoping we could see some more Steve, Harry, Smith, Stanford and Anthony then!

The extremely high opening weekend box office for the film has caused a great stir in the film community and I ran across a couple great articles concerning the SATC buzz. A blog by a male critic I love (The Cooler, I've talked about it before) talks about the strange SATC backlash from many male critics: excellent points about guys liking SATC, as well as the odd double-standard for female critics. And a recent article in Entertainment Weekly argues against the high box office being a "foreign phenomenon" - female movie-goers do exist! Both really good reads.