Featured Audience Ratings

• Candy R

  
  The girls are back together 2 years on. Marriage doesn't suit Carrie and Big. They want a break from each other. Samantha takes the girls on holiday to UAE. Carrie meets Aidan in a street market. Some stereotypes and condescending attitudes towards Middle Eastern culture and… More
  The girls are back together 2 years on. Marriage doesn't suit Carrie and Big. They want a break from each other. Samantha takes the girls on holiday to UAE. Carrie meets Aidan in a street market. Some stereotypes and condescending attitudes towards Middle Eastern culture and traditions.

• Wildaly M

  
  Basic chick flick with nothing overly exciting or special about it.

• Veronique K

  
  the reason i chose to see sex and the city 2 was because i felt like bitching about chic flicks...my primary target is "eat, prayer and love" but the dvd-rental is more expensive because it's just released! yeah, there's an option of internet free-download but… More
  the reason i chose to see sex and the city 2 was because i felt like bitching about chic flicks...my primary target is "eat, prayer and love" but the dvd-rental is more expensive because it's just released! yeah, there's an option of internet free-download but what's more miserable than watching a movie in your computer is to watch a bad movie in your computer (when the movie is good, it's easier to endure sitting in front of a computer for it)...get the logics? so the more practical and economic decision is to rent sex and the city 2 in a somehow cheaper price then watch it in your living room and get numb. haha. and, it also pleases me that there's one person in my friend-list "want to see it." (ps) i do have a sense of cinephile morality that don't bitch a movie before you watch it even when it's obviously bad. if you wanna bitch about something, name your reason articulately (i definitely try my best). perhaps it's just the way i am, i prefer not to call you an asshole crudely, but when i do, i name all the reasons why you're an asshole without using the word asshole. i'm no agist, but i do expect maturity from people (even from myself, but i try to manage it with struggles, for sure, just like everyone!) after a certain age, but the controversy here is: what's the right age for a person to be sophisticated? for the "girls" in sex and the city 2, 60?! 70?! maybe the right age for them is when botox stops working on their faces. (do i sound mean?) quite often, i feel they're living in disneyland, but come on, they're all over 40! everything about this movie is absolutely artificial and far from common senses. i did mention quite often about the idea of camp, a celebration of artifice, such as my praise over knight and day...but there's a sense of sincerity in camp, yeah, a naive self-love devoid of pretentiousness. (so it's not everything bad and fake is camp)..but sex and the city IS pretentious, encapsulated within the so called avant-garde third-wave feminism, and it has great deal to do with pop-culture ideologies in women, or let's be more specific, upper-middle class white women who have nothing to do but whine about life......and their vaginas! i'd like to focus on three specific details (if you really care about synopsis, check imdb). i point them out because i consider them crucial for character-portrayals, this movie has involved a trip for these four "fabulous" women in "new middle-east" (ali abu). FIRSTLY, they emphasize in details on all the materialistic products they carry in their luggages, for example, samantha mentions about the books she carries: suzanne somers' "breakthrough to wellness" (serious reading to her), and she mentions something for relaxation: THE US MAGZINE. then four of them scream in hysteria. and i was thinking, what, you're over 40, and you're in a sort of exquisite society which tends to value taste (they emphasize that) and class..and the entertainment for your mind is THE US MAGZINE. are you just 16? what's so different between your mind and the mind of a high-school teenager with raging hermones? except the later doesn't need botox to look young. and, one of them is a supposedly well-reputed columnist. another one of them is allegedly a harvard-graduate. isn't it a bit too un-classy? kinda un-believable, isn't it? SECONDLY, in this trip, samantha claims to her girlfriends that it's free due to her association with some tycoon in arabian world, and she keeps saying dubai is history and abu dahbi is the new fabulous middle-east. anyway, this movie poses a counterfeit attitude about their liberal welcome to the arabian exotica but somehow it keeps its superficial bombardments on the arabian culture, stereotyped racist remarks about the veiling obligation in arabian women and how sexually uptight those arabian men are. i'm not really familar with the arabian world and i might also be infected with that bias that arabian men are terrible sexists due to media presentation, but there's one part in this movie that is really hypocritical: samantha annoys the crowd of arabian men for showing off her cleaverage, then four of them escape into a secret room full of arabian housewives who actively offer helps for these four "fabulous" new-yorkers, then they take off their conventional arabian costumes and reveal themselves in the dresses from the latest catalogues of louis vutton, dior and gucci, and they're holding a book-party on the same god-damned book samantha mentions earlier: suzanna somer's "breakthru: eight stages to wellness"...it's like announcing that you third-world arabian women, under your conventional appearance, you all wanna emulate us by buying off those commodities of luxuries, we, rich american women, feel complacent to be copied and emulated while we're taking a plane to get away from your land of gender-inequalities. the only solace left for you is the commodities from the latest catagues of louis vutton, channel..you shall continue to contribute your money to our corporations even your life still stinks as hell. but we don't care as long as you continue to vent your discontentment through consummerism! THIRDLY, the character of mr. BIG is depicted as a partially conventional man who favors old black-and-white movies, and the story keeps emphasizing his love of nostalgia. his favorite thing in the world is to watch clark gable and claudette colbert's "it happened one night" in bed and he prefers to stay home on his couch eating and relaxing with those nostalgic movies. i wonder the screenwriter's choice of describing mr. big as fan of nostalgia is because women all secrely wish their men to be cultured, conventional and sophisticated (nostalgia is a reference of all those qualities.) in the mean time, woman behaves like a spoilt 40-something fashion-princess who disregards her man's frustration over the fall of stock-market, insists on her man's companionship after one laborious day. carrie even tries to pay homage to claudette colbert by showing off her leg in arabian street for taxi. the movie even features one scene of mr. big talking to penelop cruz, who is a hot spanish bank-manager in the movie, and she discusses their shared concern for the stock market in the cocktail party while carrie remains in her girl-friend circle. and i thought he's going to cheat with penelope but i almost wish it to happen..think about it, if you were a rich not-bad-looking man who's worth billions, what kind of wife you would want? you would want a wife who shares some concerns of your work-labors, instead of picking on your faults all the time, showing her non-appreciation for your interests in nostalgia and expecting to be liberated like a signle woman while you generously provide every possible luxurious item for her? if i were him, i would think: why not just court and marry peneloppe cruz?! that's common sense. gee, i'm tired of complaining about it..my point is: i could understand why some men have prejudices about chick flicks, especially sex and the city, because those women just won't step out of their enclosed circle of life! so narcissistically self-absorbed as if the world only whirls around her, and worse of all, chick flicks now degenerate into a genre for narcissistic females who think the meaning of life is the expensive clothes you wear, the travelling catalogues (third-world nations are all on the map for such consumption of exotica) and the so-called "sparkle" with their significant the other. and what the "sparkle" is made of? MONEY! everything is about money. yes, money is important in this world. but please have the decency to bare it all instead of granting it a beautified name of love! sometimes, i have an indignant sentiment why women are still so narrow-minded and short-sighted after so many decades of revolutions? i mean, when i watch movies like sex and the city 2. (of course, not all women are like that, i'm not. but the movie is popular, supposedly its popularity reflects something in its patroning audience) in conclusion, the only achievement feminism revolutions have accomplished is that women wear less clothes, spend more money, and certainly much much more fuckable than they used to be. (profanity intended for my anguish)...come to think about it, men should be grateful to movies like sex and the city, it opens millions of gates for you fellows to have gratuitous sex! (conspiracy from men) (as a matter of fact, sex and the city 2 is DIRECTED BY A MAN indeed. ha)

• Nadira I

  
  A sequel that fails terribly. Don't know why, but it feels much more like a tourist advert more than a movie. If you just want to have fun and not looking forward to actually watch a movie with quality, you can watch this movie. But the sequel was lack the good story since it… More
  A sequel that fails terribly. Don't know why, but it feels much more like a tourist advert more than a movie. If you just want to have fun and not looking forward to actually watch a movie with quality, you can watch this movie. But the sequel was lack the good story since it looks like the good ones already been used for the first one. Sorry, Michael Patrick King. But we are not going to watch Sex and the City 3 if there is one.

• Dean M

  
  This sequel film based on TV's HBO series is not as good as the original one. I believe this is unsexy for four fabulous women from New York City I've ever saw, but I was mostly starring at Alice Eve's character as Charlotte's bra-less nanny the best. I always felt… More
  This sequel film based on TV's HBO series is not as good as the original one. I believe this is unsexy for four fabulous women from New York City I've ever saw, but I was mostly starring at Alice Eve's character as Charlotte's bra-less nanny the best. I always felt the first movie was great but the characters were a wee bit different, almost too evolved. The cameos are so surprised. This story about Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Samantha (Kim Cattrall), Charlotte (Kristen Davis) and Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) now have lives that are more stressful than before and plan to go on an all-expense-paid luxury vaction to Abu Dhabi. I see there are some funny moments, but in the second half of the story was just contrived and floppy.

• Carlos M

  
  Just like the first film, this sequel is irregular and stretches indefinitely, and the four middle-aged gals are now more shallow, selfish and brainless than ever, with pathetic personal conflicts that never justify the 146 minutes. Oh and what kind of woman wears a vintage cream… More
  Just like the first film, this sequel is irregular and stretches indefinitely, and the four middle-aged gals are now more shallow, selfish and brainless than ever, with pathetic personal conflicts that never justify the 146 minutes. Oh and what kind of woman wears a vintage cream Valentino skirt while making muffins?

• Alexander W

  
  The movie includes a lot of cross culture sex references, perhaps in part something to do about Americas involvement in the Middle East of the last two decades. The ladies, who really who like to flash around are looking so old they only need to lift up the bottom of their dresses are… More
  The movie includes a lot of cross culture sex references, perhaps in part something to do about Americas involvement in the Middle East of the last two decades. The ladies, who really who like to flash around are looking so old they only need to lift up the bottom of their dresses are funny and crass if thats your tickle rib, and all over the scenes are well shot and light humoured and pick up on the subject of fashion. It wasnt a bad film, but its far from my top 10.

• jay n

  
  Crass and overlong.

• Luke B

  
  One of the most horrific film watching experiences I've had in my life. I've never seen any of the series, nor the first film, but this is disgusting, offensive, self obsessed and highly unlikable. The first travesty this film has to offer are the shallow and vacuous… More
  One of the most horrific film watching experiences I've had in my life. I've never seen any of the series, nor the first film, but this is disgusting, offensive, self obsessed and highly unlikable. The first travesty this film has to offer are the shallow and vacuous characters. In these hard economic times we are shown the troubles of women, whose biggest problems include a nanny that doesn't wear a bra, a man putting a TV in the bedroom, not liking your job as a lawyer, and getting older. Even just a glance at the first act of the film shows how despicable these women are. Carrie gets mad at her husband for buying a television for their bedroom. He does this as they enjoyed a romantic time watching Black and White movies together. Despite this, she acts as though he has cheated on her. Later she forces him to attend a movie premiere with her. He actually ends up having more fun than her, and chats with Penelope Cruz. After this she demands they leave and then gets angry when he watches some TV. These women are portrayed as victims despite their incredible wealth. There is no learning curve in this movie. The final conflict sees them racing to the airport and if they don't make it in time they will...HAVE TO TRAVEL COACH. This is all topped off with some offensive scenes involving the conservative beliefs of the middle east. It's hard to judge if this film is more offensive to the middle east, women, or Americans. I pray there is no one in existence like these characters, as they are both baffling and frustrating.

• Alexis N

  
  Ohhhkay. This movie was really long, stressful, everyone cheats on everyone and some how it's fine, let's just stay together. Samantha is way too much, Carrie just goes around ruining everything and when did Big/John turn in to Aidan?! Two hours long and the movie ends right… More
  Ohhhkay. This movie was really long, stressful, everyone cheats on everyone and some how it's fine, let's just stay together. Samantha is way too much, Carrie just goes around ruining everything and when did Big/John turn in to Aidan?! Two hours long and the movie ends right where it starts. So pointless, but at least it wasn't as bad as the 1st one.

• Summer W

  
  I love my girls, so I could sit there and watch them do nothing and still be mildly entertained. That being said, that's pretty much what happens in this film. The first movie, as well as the show, deals with some pretty heavy issues, but this one essentially entails them… More
  I love my girls, so I could sit there and watch them do nothing and still be mildly entertained. That being said, that's pretty much what happens in this film. The first movie, as well as the show, deals with some pretty heavy issues, but this one essentially entails them bitching about their perfect lives, and I had a hard time feeling sympathetic for them. Not to say there aren't some good laughs- I did let out more than a few guffaws. However this foray sticks a toe into cheese territory, and that didn't sit well with me. Overall I was quite disappointed.

• Spencer S

  
  I know...why would I do this to myself? Simple, I'm a girl. I see something sparkly and possibly feel good and I jump all over it like a kitten on a ball of yarn. That being said, I still have a modicrum of sanity, and therefore I admonish all those involved in making this film,… More
  I know...why would I do this to myself? Simple, I'm a girl. I see something sparkly and possibly feel good and I jump all over it like a kitten on a ball of yarn. That being said, I still have a modicrum of sanity, and therefore I admonish all those involved in making this film, which is another big budget Hollywood sequel that undermines cinema.

• Steven C

  
  "Sex and the City 2" is a pure afterthought. None of the it really has anything to do with the classic television series or the terrific feature film. The picture simply exists to entertain, not stimulate, like the show and first film. What you get here are the ladies… More
  "Sex and the City 2" is a pure afterthought. None of the it really has anything to do with the classic television series or the terrific feature film. The picture simply exists to entertain, not stimulate, like the show and first film. What you get here are the ladies looking fabulous and doing really annoying things for apparently no reason. Such a shame since everything previous was so calculated and resonant.

• Sanjaya &

  
  Well, the point of this movie is "girls just want to have fun", so this movie really just have a standard story with counting a help from the beautiful landscape of Abu Dhabi (which is Morocco actually) and the gorgeous clothes the ladies wear on... The girls were still… More
  Well, the point of this movie is "girls just want to have fun", so this movie really just have a standard story with counting a help from the beautiful landscape of Abu Dhabi (which is Morocco actually) and the gorgeous clothes the ladies wear on... The girls were still amazing, Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Catrall, Cynthia Nixon, and Kristin Davis, it's just relieving to see that they're still look beautiful in their age... The cameo from Miley Cyrus and Penelope Cruz was did shocked me a little, but there are also some funny moments in this movie... Overall, I don't want to blame Michael Patrick King for his script on this movie because the point of this movie is girls really just want to have fun, and yes they did having fun and me too...

• Pedro H

  
  Carrie on <br/> <br/>Its and STD in the slums of a city <br/> <br/>A horrible movie, with nothing to offer either than the envy of you being in adu dabi, honestly i should have never even entered the cinema room to watch this low acting, plotless piece of… More
  Carrie on <br/> <br/>Its and STD in the slums of a city <br/> <br/>A horrible movie, with nothing to offer either than the envy of you being in adu dabi, honestly i should have never even entered the cinema room to watch this low acting, plotless piece of shit. <br/> <br/>Never again i am going to a movie just because my ticket was paid for. This movie deserves no honest review, the sex and the city are like a mentioned an std that you will hope kills you quicker so you dont have to watch this movie. <br/> <br/>Carrie Bradshaw:You have to take the tradition, and decorate it your way

• Nicki M

  
  Okay, it's not likely to win any new fans, but if you like the girls and the show, you are going to enjoy this. A lot of people have claimed the change of location is not a good thing, but I did not personally mind it. I would not really want to see Sex & the City 3 (if… More
  Okay, it's not likely to win any new fans, but if you like the girls and the show, you are going to enjoy this. A lot of people have claimed the change of location is not a good thing, but I did not personally mind it. I would not really want to see Sex & the City 3 (if there is one, and I'm sure there will be!), set elsewhere, but for a change, this was fine. A few laughs and some more serious parts - I think most people married for a few years could relate to Carrie's situation (I really thought the reviewers calling her whiney were harsh!). Sex & the City has always been about relationships, both with girlfriends and men, and this is more of the same. At 2 and a half hours it is very long, and if you are not a fan, it is going to wear out it's welcome pretty quickly, but for me, it went pretty quick and enjoyed it.

• Wahida K

  
  No no no! What was I thinking? No well actually what were they thinking when they decided to make a sequel? "Over Driven" so to speak at some point. I dont think this Movie is my time worth to go in to details. It is a just ridiculous time waste.

• Film C

  
  wow this was a terrible movie, i wanted to walk out but thought against it as i would of had to bug a lot of people to move and i didnt wanna seem like a dick so i finished the movie and then regretted it straight away its a very long movie with a film that has no storyliine or point… More
  wow this was a terrible movie, i wanted to walk out but thought against it as i would of had to bug a lot of people to move and i didnt wanna seem like a dick so i finished the movie and then regretted it straight away its a very long movie with a film that has no storyliine or point to the movie what so ever! yes its funny in places and probably would have been funnier if i didtnt get to that point of boredem that i no longer cared if it was funny or not!!

• Nate Z

  
  Sex and the City is a cultural phenomenon that women around the globe celebrate. When the show first premiered on HBO in the late 90s, it chronicled the lives of professional women that wanted to have it all, and they wouldn't apologize for their sexual appetites or fashion… More
  Sex and the City is a cultural phenomenon that women around the globe celebrate. When the show first premiered on HBO in the late 90s, it chronicled the lives of professional women that wanted to have it all, and they wouldn't apologize for their sexual appetites or fashion splurges. The successful show then launched a very successful movie in 2008, but the movie tied up everyone's storylines in fairly nice little bows. So now where to? For the fans, it hardly matters. Sex and the City is a cause of celebration, a girl's night out with cosmo in hand. The content of the movie seems almost like an afterthought. Fans aren't going to be too picky but there is a lot to pick at with Sex and the City 2. It's two years after the events in the first film. Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) and her husband, John James "Mr. Big" Preston (Chris Noth), are settling into married life. Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) feels mistreated and unappreciated by her boss because she's a woman. Charlotte (Kristin Davis) has her hands full with two young children, and motherhood in reality isn't at glamorized as she thought. She's also worried that her husband (Evan Handler) might cheat with their busty Irish nanny (Alice Eve, the "10" from She's Out of My League). They girls dub her "Erin Go-bra-less," I think as a weird wordplay on Erin Brockovich. Your guess is as good as mine. And then there's Samantha (Kim Cattrall) who is 52 and desperately fighting to look and feel young again. She has a regiment of hormone pills and creams she uses daily to keep the encroaching effects of menopause at bay. To give the girls an excuse to get away, a rich middle Eastern sheik wants to persuade Samantha to do some PR work for his hotel, so he invites the foursome on a fabulous all-expenses-paid trip to Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. I know coming from my non-demographic perspective that I'm going to have some difficulty relating to these main characters, but these gals are so self-absorbed in their petty, rich people problems, I question who could really relate to much of this drama. Charlotte is being driven mad by the toll of motherhood, which is relatable, except her toll involves staying at home in a rich apartment, never having to worry about money, and handing off her screaming kids to the nanny. Not relatable. Carrie's dilemma is the most forced and therefore the worst of the bunch. After having her storyline tied up in the first film, where can she go? She has got the guy, she got her wedding, she has a luxurious apartment, and her man wants to spend time with her. She's in her mid-to-late 40s at this point and wants to still go out every night on the town. She complains that they stay in TWO NIGHTS a week. When Big gets her a thoughtful anniversary gift, a flat-screen TV in the bedroom so that they can watch old romantic movies TOGETHER, she pouts and says, "Jewelry would have been nice." Her main problem is that her guy, the one she married, wants to spend time with his wife in their comfy abode and relax TOGETHER. When Carrie asks for two days leave so she can get some work done on an article, Big allows her the time off and then wonders if that apply to their marriage: each takes a day or two off to concentrate on work, relax, catch up with friends, etc. It's her idea, but when he voices it suddenly it becomes threatening and again all about Carrie. She responds, "Is this because I'm a bitch wife who nags you?" Well, at least she cuts to the chase. These are the problems that people have when they don't actually have any real problems. There is one, count 'em, one great scene in the movie and it doesn't involve Carrie or the ever increasingly cartoonish Samantha. Charlotte and Miranda are by themselves sipping from cocktails and confessing about the hardships of motherhood. Both take sips and then admit a guilty secret. One says she feels like a failure at being a mother. Another admits that being a stay-at-home mom just isn't enough for her in life. They both admit that they love their children dearly, but have enjoyed the time away from them. The scene feels genuine, with some heartfelt laughs derived from the situation. Charlotte bashfully admits that her first thoughts following the idea that her husband might cheat with the nanny were, "No, I can't lose that nanny," and it feels honest and right for her character, plus it's funny. And then they admit something that the audience had fortuitously forgotten in that moment -- they do all this with help. Charlotte has a nanny and Miranda has her grandmother-in-law living with them to help raise the kids. A really nicely written and acted moment that peels away to showcase the complexities of the modern mother is dashed. Even the universal concerns we can all relate to (infidelity, doubt, settling, getting older) take a backseat to the overly manufactured melodrama. The rampant consumerism hasn't slowed down despite the economic meltdown of 2008. Carrie makes a quick comment about how it "wasn't a good time to sell her apartment," and so she keeps her spacious apartment along with the multi-million dollar one she lives with Big. The sheer celebration of consumerism has turned into blind worship; it's all about the stuff. The characters have long since burrowed into their types (the fussy one, the career-minded one, the sexually voracious one, and the self-involved one), and those types have become entrenched, and the men have become just another accessory for a large closet of goods. The real star of this movie is the outlandish, sometimes garish, fashion, and there is heaps of it. One outing into the Arabic desert makes use of three separate costume changes. The name-dropping and product placement are aggressive. For the first film I wrote: "'I'm not going to charge the film with setting back feminism or anything but why do the main characters have to be so shallow, brand-conscious, and live to splurge? The emphasis on buy, buy, buy to make yourself feel good is a rather sad and empty message." The Sex and the City movies have morphed into consumerist, female wish-fulfillment fantasies, enabling Carrie's princess indulgences and superficial demands. The girls are all panicked towards the end about he possibility of, gasp, flying coach, you know, like the rest of us. These women haven't lived in anything resembling reality for some time. It's a shame that in these cost-conscious times, the Sex and the City universe seems unaffected. I would have enjoyed seeing how these high-powered women dealt with the repercussions of an economic recession (not to mention Carrie dealing with the death of print publishing). Yes, I know, it's designed to be escapism, and that's all well and good, but I wanted to escape from these characters and their lifestyles. But what will get the most attention is the extensively long escapade in the Middle East, like Sex and the City is planning to solve global politics. Obviously, there is something wrong with how women are treated in Muslim countries, from the demands to cover themselves in heavy garments so as not to tempt men, to the void of rights, to honor killings and stonings, and murdering women just because they went to school. This is a serious matter. The Arab world is behind the times and women deserve an equal footing and an equal say, and several contemporary movies have dealt with these issues in a thoughtful manner. Sex and the City 2, on the other hand, takes a patronizing approach that is culturally insensitive at best and downright racially insulting at worst. These ambassadors of modern feminist thinking basically show themselves to the Arab world as the quintessential ugly Americans; the ladies of Sex and the City are exactly what radicals think about when they order women to cover up or else. These women are self-indulgent, materialistic, vapid, and riding high on Western self-righteousness. I am in no way apologizing for how large portions of the Muslim world treat women, but Carrie and company are quite possible the worst ambassadors to argue the case for feminine equality. And remember, they complain about their pity-party problems while on an all-expenses-paid vacation to a lifestyle of lavish luxury in the Middle East. They reduce the problem of Muslim women into simplistic, indignant quips. It's more than a little insulting to have somebody wearing clownish outfits telling women in other countries how to dress. This foursome is brash and in-your-face with their strong sense of cultural superiority, practically baiting the locals into making a scene. At one point, Samantha is jailed and shocked that the authorities might be upset that she was caught having sex on their beach. Don't these women understand culture clash? In the end the women are chased out of town and you almost (I repeat -- almost) feel for the other side. Even worse than the ethically dubious moralizing is the fact that this extended portion of the movie (about 100 minutes) grinds the plot to a halt. Most of the storylines are set up before the trip, and then they are all tied up somehow when the women return, though the time in Abu Dhabi seems to have had no effect. Miranda's conflict with her boss is resolved before the gals ever get on a plane, so she becomes essentially tour guide and confidant for the trip. Samantha is denied her plethora of pills at the airport, so she becomes the slapstick comic relief trying to stave off menopause. Her pun-heavy dialogue is full of groaners like, "Lawrence of my labia." Her sex kitten act is getting as tiresome as her futile attempts to keep Mother Nature at bay. Samantha is the same from the beginning of the movie to the end, and fans will probably rejoice at this lack of character development. The entire misadventure in Abu Dhabi feels like a Hope/Crosby road picture, or, worse, one of those lame TV-movie gimmicks from sitcoms (luckily Carrie is spared the curse of the tiki idol). But whatever I say will be regarded with shrugs by the legions of Sex and the City fans. They've grown with these characters over 12 years, so I understand the attachment fans feel. Like I said before, the movie medium is not the ideal place for these ladies. In half hour doses their quirks and problems seem cute, but when stretched to a bloated running time they come across as vapid and whiny. The conflicts don't seem too relatable and the humor is once again tied to slapstick and leaden puns. The problem is that after six seasons and one 145-minute movie, the characters feel tapped out. They've been through plenty and now the crew is just coming up with whatever excuse they can have to reunite the cast on the big screen (stay tuned for Sex and the City 3 ... in Space!). Nate's Grade: C

• William D

  
  "Sex and the City 2" is not at all as bad as you've heard, but it's definitely weaker than its predecessor. Anyone who misses the girls (or misses high-end, urbane trash) will get plenty of pleasure reacquainting with them and seeing how their lives are going.… More
  "Sex and the City 2" is not at all as bad as you've heard, but it's definitely weaker than its predecessor. Anyone who misses the girls (or misses high-end, urbane trash) will get plenty of pleasure reacquainting with them and seeing how their lives are going. How has Carrie adjusted to married life? Will she become a mother? How is Samantha adjusting to being in her 50s? Is she still sexually adventurous? These questions are answered. The problem is that writer/ director Michael King so often loses touch with the original inspiration for the series. Gay campiness intrudes one too many times, and occasionally the film is so stylistically and tonally off that it seems to be mocking itself. A karaoke rendition of Helen Reddy's "I Am Woman" wins the prize for the sequence most colossally off pitch. I was waiting for them to break into the Macarena next. Why not a Village People song? The clothes have always been a wild card in the show, but I've never seen costume designer Patricia Field so crass and devoid of style as often as she is here. Samantha's spiky shoulder accessories in the karaoke scene were particularly shocking in their awfulness. They looked like they'd been borrowed from the set of a Monty Python movie parodying the Middle Ages. But there's no denying that anyone desperately missing the 'Sex and the City' girls will enjoy many of the scenes in this film. My companion and I laughed out loud at least a dozen times, a much-needed lift. And we really did enjoy being reminded of the 1990s. Normally I hate nostalgia. But Carrie at one point says, "And just like that, it was 1998 all over again." My sold-out audience cheered.

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