Sex and the City 2 review

Two years after the first Sex and the City movie, based on the popular television series, comes the creatively titled Sex and the City 2: a film just as unnecessary as the first. While it does provide the legions of Jimmy Choo-wearing fans with everything they could want - fashion, shopping, Samantha sex jokes and more fashion - it does little to add to the territory explored in the TV series.

The sequel picks up two years after the first film, with the women struggling to deal with the various `stresses' in their lives. Charlotte (Kristin Davis), despite the help of a full-time nanny, is finding the demands of motherhood challenging, Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) is having trouble juggling her job as a lawyer and her responsibilities as a mother, Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) is terrified she and Mr. Big (Chris Noth) are becoming an old, married couple and Samantha (Kim Cattrall), as the only single member of the group, is struggling to keep her sex drive alive at 52. To escape from their problems the ladies jet-off to Abu Dhabi on a luxury vacation where Carrie runs into a former flame and, in a vaguely offensive plot turn, they find their style and attitudes clash with the Muslim society.

Sex and the City 2 is at least an hour too long and the running time of almost two and a half hours will leave even hardcore followers of the series itching for the end credits. We really didn't need to see every room of their hotel suite, every furniture item in their NYC homes or the plethora of slo-mo shots of outfit after outfit. Yes, I get it, a large part of it is about the clothes, but there was always a balance of substance and style in the TV series. Some audiences might also find it hard to relate to four, upper-class white women whose greatest problems are wearing the same ridiculously overpriced dress as Miley Cyrus to a premiere or the possibility of having to fly coach. The horror! Did I mention it's girly? So sickeningly girly I'm at the point where if I hear the word `sparkle' or another freakin wind-chime effect when something `magical' happens, I'm going to put Sarah Jessica Parker down like the Afghan dog she so closely resembles (exhibit A).

There was at least some point to the first film as it existed to tie up all the loose ends of the series and it did have some groundbreaking sex scenes shown from a female perspective (for once). But the franchise has become like the female equivalent of the James Bond series: it's all about the clothes, the glamour, the tongue-in-cheek named characters, the sex and the same staple of fans will trot along to see it regardless.

Instead of progressing into the new aspects of their lives, the main characters have become the Barbie dolls of gay men as they try to revive the glory days when they were much younger, much sassier and much more interesting. But unfortunately these women stopped representing Sex and the City about six years ago. Now they are more like Menopause in the Desert.

Sex and the City 2 opens in cinemas on Thursday, but in the meantime Filmdrunk (my favourite website in all the land) pointed me to this delicious and far superior review of the film here. Check it out or perish.

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That Thing you do

See that? See what I did there with the headline? Clever huh *insert cricket noise and tumble weed here. Moving on…uber-talented Australian lad Joel Edgerton is set star in a remake of The Thing.

The Hollywood remake is said to be a remake of John Carpetner’s `82 version of The Thing which was a remake of the Howard Hanks’ `51 film The Thing From Another World which was a take on the `38 short Who Goes There?

If you lead a more exciting life then I, a fun game could be played involving a shot of whiskey every time I use the word `remake’. An even funner game would be a shot every time Hollywood did another remake (shot!) which would have you in a medically induced coma in 45 minutes ….approximately.

Remake (shot!) negativity aside, I’m actually semi-excited about this, mainly because Edgerton (below) is involved and frankly, I consider him a bit of a multi-talented, cinematic genius. Did I mention his most recent film Animal Kingdom picked up the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance? And don’t even get me started on The Square.

The Thing follows a shape-shifting alien who terrorizes a group of people in Antarctica. Sounds a bit like the first Alien Vs Predator to me, but less shit.

Mary Elizabeth Winstead will co-star, which is good if she behaves like she did in Death Proof and frightening if she pulls a Make It Happen. Her character is a PhD candidate (cough) who joins a Norwegian research team in Antarctica after it discovers an alien ship in the ice. When the trapped organism is freed and begins a series of attacks, she is forced to team up with a blue-collar mercenary helicopter pilot (Edgerton) to stop the rampage.

Dutch producer Matthijs Van Heijningen makes his directorial debut with The Thing which begins filming on March 15 in Toronto.

No word yet on a release date or 3D inclinations.

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