The anticipated Sex and the City sequel was filled with “sparkle” as Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Miranda (Cynthia Nixon), Charlotte (Kristin Davis), and Samantha (Kim Cattrall) reunited for an exotic vacation for the fist time since Carrie’s unpleasant Mexican honeymoon two years earlier.
The film opens up with a monologue by Carrie, as is consistent to the first film and HBO series. She reflects on how she met her three closest girlfriends in the days she refers to as B.C. (Before Carrie). There’s a wedding scene where Liza Minelli makes a cameo appearance and both conducts the ceremony and sings Beyonce’s “Single Ladies,” charming the audience with humor.
Where the sequel differs from the original is that 3 out of 4 women are now married, Carrie being the newest wed. Their lives have become realistic and stressful and while Carrie’s glamorous life has become dull with her husband, Big (Chris Noth) wanting to stay home and watch TV, she yearns for the life she once had.
Carrie meets up with her long-lost love Aidan (John Corbett), thousands of miles away from New York. Was it fate? Did it mean something? These were questions she asked herself. Both of them, now married to others, ended up going on a dinner date in Abu Dhabi, which resulted in a sudden impulsive kiss shared before departing in regret.
She felt guilty immediately. She felt so guilty that she convinced herself that she needed to call her husband right away to let him know, which becomes Carrie’s climactic drama, which is inevitable in any Sex and the City storyline.
If there is to be anything negative said about this film, it would be that the storyline seemed a bit flat. With a role opposite the previous film, Miranda struggles with a male coworker who keeps silencing her with his hand. Samantha partakes in a Suzanne Somers diet regiment to repress her menopause symptoms. Charlotte comes to grips with the stress of motherhood, while being insecure about the bra-less nanny that takes care of her kids.
These roles are nothing however, compared to the director’s focus upon Carrie’s concern over trying to make sense of her glamorous marital needs and how they conflict with her husbands. They fight like a couple that sincerely wants to survive, working their way toward compromise and an understanding that a relationship need not be traditional in order to succeed. And the film ends with a predictable, and sweet closing which-once again-leaves you loving the Carrie Bradshaw love story we all have followed.
The film was rather long with a running time of 2 hours and 25 minutes, and seemed to drag on with a rather finicky plot. However, for diehard Sex and the City fans like myself, it was absolutely crucial for me to see the film and keep up with my favorite New York City writer. With such booming box office numbers the first weekend, I believe I am not alone in my decision. Let’s hope if they come out with a third film that it is more eventful and less humdrum.
