sex and the city 2

sex and the city 2 is writer/director michael patrick king's attempts to show the ever after the princess marries her mr. big. her marriage and charlotte's new baby have both reached the terrible twos and each women struggles with how to keep the "sparkle" in their relationship.

based on candace bushnell's 'now have a life of their own' fictional characters, these women are four faces of eve (or eve-ry woman)-the good girl, charlotte, the bad girl, samantha, the career girl, miranda and carrie, the little girl who doesn’t want to grow up. the modern day pippi longstockings who lives in a mansion that has an attic filled with pirate gold. she has no parents, makes up her own rules, wears tiaras, and never has to grow old. she's the girl i always wanted to be- pippi, carrie not so much. carrie at heart is a self sabotaging drama queen in a tutu.

and speaking of queens and tutu's, a lot of the film's laughs are sight gags of over the top, bigger than a libarace wet dream, gay gliches running willy nilly. but back to the women...

these are four very self involved, selfish people. well, two are wives and mothers and two are much freer souls, so they balance each other out, because four women running amok wouldn't be as interesting. we need to see the flipside. but miranda and charlotte do allow themselves their me time when persuaded by their unencumbered counter parts. and this is probably why this show appeals to all women. because out of all the outrageous clothing, jewelry, shoes, handbags, men and locations- the most decadent extravagance of them all is their selfishness. women rarely get to live selfish, me first lives. look at your friends, sisters, mothers, and yourselves- selfless to an exhausting fault most of them.

so, these ambassadors of american womanhood take their carrie nation tent show to the least woman centric area in the world- the middle east. amongst un here to before seen luxury, they encounter and conflict with the locals. i have little patience with people who refuse to behave respectfully of another’s culture, especially while they are physically in it, so one storyline became tiresome at times. besides that, some carrie drama that would have been prevented if she’d learned her lesson the first time she made that same mistake, charlotte’s nanny and miranda’s office issues, there is very little story here. there is some women's lib posturing which comes off as anachronistic instead of enlightening. and it all happens far outside 'the city'- in a land where apparently it’s against the law to have sex. but there is plenty of the pretty to look at and luckily for the franchise, i’m easily distracted by shiny objects, yes even after 2.5 hours!

as for the men in this women first world, as my friend leslie pointed out, michael patrick king is setting the bar too high with mr big- a gorgeous rich clever man who only wants to cuddle with his wife in bed while watching black and white romantic comedies and then when she miss steps he punishes her with jewels. on top of that he’s appreciative, listens, and takes responsibility for his part in her episodes. all the men in sex and the city's world are idealized. they all consider themselves lucky to be with these strong, special, selfish women. the men may falter, they are only men after all, but they realize their mistakes and beg to come back into the orbit of these super star women. this has to be another big part of the universal appeal to women of this series, another rare extravagance- appreciative and grateful men.

overall, i liked this movie better than sex and the city 1, more pretty, less annoying drama.

the secret in their eyes

if you are going to only one foreign film about the solving of a decades old murder of a young girl, skip the swedish and go argentinian. "the secret in their eyes" is the 2010 academy award winner for best foreign film. and that's all we knew about it when we went. my friend thought it had something to do with peron because it is partially set in the 70's. while that is historically correct, juan jose campanella, writer and director, brought to the screen a multi-layered story based on eduardo sacheri's novel of human relationships real and or imagined between co-workers and friends, lovers and victims, criminals and judges, god's law and man's laws.

this was unexpectedly funny, smart, neatly executed and a pleasure to watch. ricardo darin was very sympathetic as a detective who is called to crime scene, the murder of a young newlywed, which will change the path of many lives. the cast is excellent, everyone works together very well and very believably. i'm not going to tell you any more of the plot, you should discover it just as i did. this film is now my number 1 favorite film of 2009.

i still like "the girl with the dragon tattoo", but it's impossible not to compare the two because of the basic plot. "the secret in their eyes" has so much more going on that is by far the superior of the two.

animal abuse warning: a little dog is kicked - the actual kick is off camera but the dog rolls across the screen as it yelps. it was meant to be funny, and people did laugh i'm never amused by hurting animals.