In the very centre of Hell, where, according to Dante Alighieri’s The Divine Comedy, a giant Satan resides in an icy palace of horror, one could imagine such a macabre scene replaced with a giant Piranese-like screening room showing Michael Patrick King’s Sex and the City 2 for all eternity.
Imagine it. Lost souls are gathered not into an icy pit of infinite despair but tied down into a really uncomfortable chair – no premier seating – and subjected to this. What a truly skin-crawling nightmare for the condemned. If you’re quiet enough, the faint echo of their cries can be heard on each Halloween night. Although if they’re in the very centre of Hell, they probably deserve my fantasy punishment.
Film critic Mark Kermode pointed out during his own review of SATC 2 that it runs for the same length as Stanley Kubrick’s sci-fi masterpiece, 2001: A Space Odyssey. One movie takes in the ancient past and distant future of human history and the other is a movie about four middle-aged women attending an OTT gay wedding and then taking a freebie holiday. For two hours and twenty minutes.
If you want to be really perverse you could compare SATC2 to an arthouse film, given that nothing at all happens but events take place in a slow, ponderous way. We aren’t treated to an existentialist tract, but you may want to question your existence and human nature afterwards. To be fair the odd one-liner and observation raises a chuckle here and there but at no point does King’s picture justify such a lengthy running time. It borders on the surreal. In fact, it feels televisual and un-cinematic for a good hour or so. Not even Penelope Cruz could liven things up for her one minute cameo.
Continue reading Sex And The City 2 – DVD Review
