My SATC2 wrap up

I don’t want to be another person to slate Sex and the City 2 (SATC2) (and there have been many), but I have to be honest SATC2 movie was offensively bad.

Not just for the racial stereotypes that had been dragged, kicking and screaming out of the 1980s, not just for any cultural insensitivity that was apparent in Samantha’s flaunting of her sexuality all over a country that considers sex taboo, but because it was so incredibly self-indulgent.

I groaned in my seat when these four women who I have loved for over a decade, rose from their seats in some ostentatious bar in “Abu-Dhabi” to sing “I am woman”.  When the mostly female crowd roared their approval, my temper nearly rose as some stereotypically oppressed women joined in the celebration of womanhood and were figuratively liberated by these feminist crusaders.

I don’t remember SATC being that cringe-worthy. I remember watching four intelligent, capable, strong, funny, tangible women going about their daily lives without banging on about being strong, independent, capable women. It was never overt, it was always just the case. Talking about it  made it seem, to me, completely contrived. Perhaps it’s because my mother always said, “the loudest tin has the least in it,” and it was one of many Asian-idioms that has stuck in my head.

Additionally, the movie foolishly and clumsily assumes that women of all races and classes want the same thing. Contemporary feminist theory suggests that not all women experience oppression in the same way. That in fact, what we perceive as oppression might not, to a woman of a different race and ethnicity, be oppressive.

I recall one of my first sociology lecturers telling us that Aboriginal women are all for the feminist movement but want something different to what western women want. In fact, I recall her saying, Aboriginal feminists want homes free of violence, not the shattering of the glass ceiling.  Basically, contemporary feminist theory tells us that we need to stop assuming that all women want the same thing. At least until we do the research.

The whole movie just seemed a bit full of itself. From the ridiculously over the top saturation of wealth of the characters, to the wastefulness to concepts that were so basic they barely scraped the surface of the complexities of the roles that a women will play in her daily life – from that of mother, manager, employee, employer, wife and sex goddess. Yet the series was amazing. How did this movie fall so short?

SATC2, to me, failed to be the fabulous movie I was hoping for and even reflect the core elements that I have come to love from the show. I feel like the writers took on a subject matter that was beyond the parameters of the characters and beyond my expectations as a cinema going fan. To me, it failed as an intelligent social commentary and as far as I can remember there weren’t nearly enough shoes, Choos and fabulous frocks!