Cast: Sarah Jessica Parker, Cynthia Nixon, Kim Cattrall, Jennifer Hudson

Director: Michael Patrick King

Screenplay: Michael Patrick King

Genre: Romantic Comedy

Running time: 2 hrs 22 mins



CRITIQUE:


Those squeals and shrill cries you hear are from bands of women unfalteringly worshiping the recent girl-squad outing of the feminist quartet – and none of it is from the male species. Surely, the yin of the women’s yang are either figuratively spoonfed by the film or coerced to watch it with their fanatical wives, or perhaps if one is neither, then the best excuse is curiosity: people would wonder on what extent does SEX & THE CITY transform into the cinematic screen. And if you say during a post-film debate “This is utter crap!”, that strange noise you hear is your wife sharpening her knives, or your girlfriend flexing their fingers ready to claw at you with their nails.


Yet this is how SEX & THE CITY treats the male species: fortunately it doesn’t reduce the dignity of men, but somehow men dissolve in the background as weaklings, emotionally incapable, easily manipulated, savage animals. On a remorseful note, oftentimes at the crosshair of sexual desire (not that we’re complaining). After all, this is a women’s film, so men could have a change to shut their gobs about FIGHT CLUB and SCARFACE. If STAR WARS, INDIANA JONES and THE LORD OF THE RINGS are the boys’ orgiastic-cinematic machismo, then SEX & THE CITY is quite possibly the girls’ wet dream, if they ever have one.


As claimed by Sarah Jessica Parker’s matter-of-fact, know-it-all yet capable narration, women in New York revolves around two L’s: Labels and Love. Sadly, perhaps nobody mentioned to Parker that what she was narrating was actually the whole plot of the film. And this felt like a vehicle for fabulous fashion and big-named dresses, to tell a story about four fortysomething female New Yorkers who struggle to pin down relationship under bombastic frocks, or chase marriage on a pair of Manolohs. Parker’s Carrie Bradshaw decides to settle with hubby Mr Big yet outrageously deteriorates; Charlotte squeals about satisfaction that handsomeness in a man is not everything in the world; Miranda wages war with herself and her husband about a prolonged abstinence, and Samantha seeks for pleasure despite of his Beckhamesque Hollywood actor boyfriend in the eyes of a hunky neighbour. In spite of Parker’s best efforts to charm, the kudos really goes to Kim Cattrall’s Samantha, who retains the comic relief in the film, and Jennifer Hudson as Carrie’s assistant, the real charming soul of the entire movie. Even Cynthia Nixon’s Miranda deserves an applaud too, finding the darkest of the characters and conveys it with a heart.


But this is a film that lacks heart, or subtlety. It drenches in the been-there-done-that territory and there’s nothing fresh that’s worth squealing about. SEX & THE CITY should have learned from THE SIMPSONS that what stays in the telly, stays in the telly. The most surprising thing is, as what the title suggests, the film lacks steam and raunch, as it feels forced to uphold emotions over carefree caper that never becomes triumphant. Instead, it stays right there, pedestrian. And those snores you hear are from men, without a doubt. It’s just excruciatingly long and too self-contained.



VERDICT:

This chick-flick-phobia inducing hoopla feels like an episode still, an unnecessary cinematic outing for a band of women who have been around since sitcoms became famous. Gold for women, diamonds for fans, crap for the lads.



RATING: C