A Word for Sex and the City

I think that the hatred directed towards this film is a whole lot of hypocrisy run amok. ¬†No, it’s not “giving the women what they want,” it’s allowing female characters to wade in the same thick soup of shit male characters do. And somehow, that has stirred up a whole lot of hate. ¬†Like Sarah Palin hate.

I thought about this as I drove down Riverside Blvd and saw an ad for the A-Team. ¬†No one is going to say a thing that someone slathered our multiplexes with this kind of trash, and no one would ever make sweeping statements about men, about their poor taste, or about they are ignorantly wandering into theaters expecting that the theater owners are going to give them what they want and instead they’re getting shit.

Nope. ¬†You drive through McDonald’s knowing full well that you are getting artery-clogging, vitamin deficient, fattening, unhealthy crap. ¬†And so? ¬†Is the woman any worse for going through the drive-through than the man? ¬†I haven’t seen such vicious writing about a film since The Proposal, since it’s being brought up. ¬†The point here, folks, is that men can do it and get away with it probably because we’re so used to it. ¬†But women? ¬†Blacks? Gay men and women? ¬†I suppose they have to be held to a higher standard. ¬†Don’t make the crap, don’t go see the crap.

I think it’s more than a little unfair. ¬†When it’s Sacha Baron Cohen lampooning every ethnic and cultural group everyone chalks it up to being funny and no one really cares that much. ¬†When it’s done in Sex and the City it’s given enough respect to call it insulting and racists and blah blah blah.

I haven’t seen the film and I don’t plan to. ¬†But the reviews and comments about it, from people who, incidentally, probably haven’t yet seen it either, need to be put in check.

A few blurbs:

“putrefying, rotten and vile quite like this sequel.”

“This is the new torture porn.” (please, not even close)

“Sarah Jessica Parker is now 45 years old, and, frankly, I cannot stomach another moment of the simpering, mincing, hair-tossing, eyelash-batting little-girl shtick she’s been pulling ever since she emerged…” (From Ella Taylor, no less)

“As Carrie might type on her laptop while giving one of her girly little shrugs, When did Sex and the City become so long and mean so little?¬†” (When did ever mean so much?)

“As tasteless as an Arabian cathouse, as worn-out as your 1998 flip-flops and as hideous as the mom jeans Carrie wears with a belly-baring gingham top, Sex and the City 2 is two of the worst movies of the year.”

“Some of these people make my skin crawl. The characters of Sex and the City 2 are flyweight bubbleheads living in a world which rarely requires three sentences in a row.” (Ebert)

For those who panned the film, fine.  It deserved to be panned. But one has to marvel at the relish each critic and would-be critic had in sharpening the blade and sticking it into each of these women.  What I want to know is, where is this viciousness with other pieces of garbage released week after week into theaters?  It simply does not exist, not with the same amount of venom.

Now you’re all going to say that I’m being too sensitive – after all, you’ve seen plenty of bad films get trashed in the same way. ¬†I haven’t. ¬†The movie is bad, fine. ¬†So criticize the film. ¬†But to launch such personal attacks on the women involved is, to be, yet one more reason we are leaning more and more towards a socially acceptable bullying culture. ¬†This kind of talk about women specifically is rampant on the net. ¬†Am I saying you should be nice because they’re girls? ¬†Nope. ¬†But don’t hate on them just because they are. ¬†At least trash a few male-driven craptastrophes to even the score. ¬†Or maybe just rise above it entirely. ¬†When did film criticism become character assassination anyway? It’s like a culture of Addison DeWitts.

And I don’t think the movie will make a lot of money. ¬†It’s been panned too severely. ¬†And maybe this is what they deserve. ¬†Maybe they got too cocky and thought, what the hell, let’s wring a few more bucks out of this franchise. ¬†Yeah, that’s never been done before .