Because of Fran's post on the movie, "Sex and the City", I decided to see the it on the day following. I was going to the early afternoon movie, but I did not make it. Then the goal was the late afternoon movie, which I missed, too, but I did make the evening showing, and I loved it. It was two hours of pure delight for me.
I love New York. It's my second favorite city, my first being my home town, New Orleans. I had only watched the TV show rarely, because, at least in the early days, there was too much easy sleeping around, and that puts me off. I'm old and perhaps old-fashioned, but I think sex should be for special people in our lives with whom have made a commitment What were they thinking?
In the movie, each of the women has a special man in her life, so the easy sex was not there. In many ways, the movie played into one of the besetting sins here in the US of the desire to acquire material things, gorgeous clothes and shoes, beautiful hair styling, a luxurious apartment, so much of what I deplore. Yet I live in relative luxury compared to millions of people in the world. Mea culpa! Am I the one to judge? What kind of dissonance is in operation when I take such delight in such a movie? Well, it was about love and about forgiveness, and I am an incurable romantic. So. And the characters were basically decent people, who were mostly kind to each other and to others outside their circle. Also, I liked the music, even if the sound was a bit loud for my taste.
Several years ago, I spent a week with two of my sister's wealthy friends at their home. It was a week of luxury living such as I have never experienced, limousine pick-up at the airport, dining out, a night at the opera, a visit to a spa, my own suite with a private walled garden with a view of the mountains, a bathroom with a glass wall, with the same lovely view of the mountains, and I adored every minute. It was a week in fantasy land, not in the land of reality, but I lapped it up, and I remember it with great delight. Would I want to live like that all the time? No, not at all.
Was it the same lust for earthly things and pleasures that was in operation in my enjoyment of the movie? It's not the real world, but it's a lovely world of the imagination to inhabit for a spell. Of course, I could be wrong. My enjoyment could well be a demonstration of my inherent fallenness and shallowness. To paraphrase Fox News, I report. You decide.
With thanks to my friend, Fran for the recommendation.
I'm glad you enjoyed it. I've been on the fence about seeing it, especially since I saw a couple of early unfavorable reviews. The problem I have with it is that the t.v. series ended after six years near perfectly in a special two-part episode. To me, trying to go beyond that in a movie would be like going beyond other well-ending t.v. series (MASH comes to mind). After a perfect ending, who wants to see more?
ReplyDeleteFor people like yourself who saw few if any of the t.v. episodes, it is good to hear that there was some life to it.
I am wondering a bit about how wealth and designer clothes seem to have overtaken things in the movie when the t.v. show, while unreal in its own way, didn't veer that much in that direction. Miranda and Carrie always lived quite modestly in terms of their apt/condos, and the fashion angle was an odd mix of designer shoes and funky stuff that could have come as easily from a thrift store as anywhere else. The show itself winked at the discrepancy between Carrie's career as an undoubtedly low-paid newspaper column-writer and her expensive taste in shoes. In one episode after she breaks up with Aidan, which required her to try to buy out his share of the apartment she had long lived in, and which had gone condo, she had to sheepishly admit that she would have had the money for the down payment if she hadn't spent so much on shoes (Miranda helpfully did the calculations for her). In another marvelous episode, a pair of shoes goes missing at the home of someone who has recently had a baby who inexplicably does not want her guests to walk on the floor (as if anyone who has a toddler is going to keep floors clean anyway), and then the hostess tears into Carrie for having such expensive shoes and not being "serious" like she had to become after having a baby. In the end, Carrie gets the shoes replaced in a delightful odd take on the whole baby shower/wedding shower gift meme. It that's the kind of funny, quirkiness of the t.v. show which, among other things, puts the clothes and shoes in a context that has a meaning other than random greed or excess, that is hard to imagine on the big screen along with whatever marketing considerations compelled them to fill it with big name designer items.
Anyway, I don't really want to see a storyline that brings on storm clouds into the lives of Miranda and Steve, Carrie and Big, and Samantha and Smith (I'm assuming Charlotte and Harry are o.k. -- just more stuff about babies and children). There were plenty of difficult times and painful moments before that based on serious themes ranging from abortion to cancer. The series worked through the characters' struggles with lives and careers and boyfriends, searching for and finally finding real, lasting partnerships with men, being honest about themselves and their sexual desires and habits, all with a terrific sense of humor, a flair for romance, a deep and abiding appreciation for friendship, and an overall joie de vivre that was cantagious. It necessarily ended in the kind of happy ending that a Shakespearian comedy would. How can one add to that? Why would anyone want to?
Well, those are rhetorical questions. All's well if people enjoy the show anyway.
[What I'd really like to know is what on earth you think "easy sex" is, Mimi, but I wouldn't want to risk sending Jonathan's x-rating system off the charts!]
In the sense that I use the words, easy sex = casual sex, no more no less, and certainly no more details to send the rating system off the charts.
ReplyDeleteI guess it is different going to see the movie without the baggage of having followed the series. In the movie, they all seemed fairly affluent. You'd have to be just to live in Manhattan, unless you're one of the lucky ones with a rent-controlled apartment, right? Of course, I could be wrong.
Glad that you enjoyed it. You know that I find most of it totally unrealistic... and fun.
ReplyDeleteExcept for the main point, these women are friends.
That is the real story.
I am at a bit of a loss here, not being a TV watcher and one who rarely goes to the movies. I understand the series and film are vastly popular. M*A*S*H - now that I remember and love!
ReplyDelete"I'm old and perhaps old-fashioned"
ReplyDeleteOh, yes, how true. You know there is just something in the title that almost makes one recoil. I mean, actually using the "S" word in the title.
Of course, I never watched the series and don't intend to see the movie.
Sappy girl stuff, you know. . .
Yes, Fran, it is about friendship, and that is a lovely thing.
ReplyDeleteRR, I remember MASH. That was quite good.
Oddly, Grandpère wants to see the movie. He couldn't go Saturday, but I said I'd go back with him to see it again.
Jim, see how bold I am. There is "the word" right in the title of the post.
I haven't seen a movie in a theatre for SO LONG. don't think I can get husband to go with me to this one either.
ReplyDeleteby the way, I'm old-fashioned, too. and I don't have HBO either, which is old-fashioned in another way.
ReplyDeleteWould someone who hasn't had a television hooked up in her house since 1997 and who has never seen an episode of "Sex in the City" get anything at all out of this movie? What do you think?
ReplyDeleteDiane, I love the mystique of the movie theater, watching in a dark place, without the distractions of home movie watching. I grew up in movie theaters. We went three times a week, Friday night, Saturday night, and Sunday afternoon, for years and years. The kids from my neighborhood filled up a row in the theater.
ReplyDeleteWe just got HBO so Grandpère could watch "John Adams". We almost took the box back to the cable company, because we had difficulty using the remote, but we finally learned.
Boocat, I didn't really watch the series much. The movie stands on its own. Are you a romantic?