We’ve been thinking it for two long years. All of us. Gnawing our cheeks at night, clutching at sweaty sheets, our faces hollow and gray, our once-bright eyes dimmed by the pain of too many questions. Sometimes we cry out, en masse, to a faceless god and a cold, indifferent universe that holds its secrets close. What… rasps the death rattle of our collective sanity. What is the lubrication level of Samantha Jones’s 52-year-old vagina? Has the change of life dulled its sparkle? Do its aged and withered depths finally chafe from the endless pounding, pounding, pounding—cruel phallic penance demanded by the emotionally barren sexual compulsive from which it hangs? If I do not receive an update on the deep, gray caverns of Jones, I shall surely die!
Please don’t die. The answer is… fine. Samantha’s vagina is doing fine. She rubs yams on it, okay? She takes 48 vagina vitamins a day. It accepts unlimited male penises with the greatest of ease. Now let us never speak of it again.
Sex and the City 2 makes Phyllis Schlafly look like Andrea Dworkin. Or that super-masculine version of Cynthia Nixon that Cynthia Nixon dates. Or, like, Ralph Nader (wait, bad example—Schlafly totally does look like Ralph Nader in a granny wig). SATC2 takes everything that I hold dear as a woman and as a human—working hard, contributing to society, not being an entitled cunt like it’s my job—and rapes it to death with a stiletto that costs more than my car. It is 146 minutes long, which means that I entered the theater in the bloom of youth and emerged with a family of field mice living in my long, white mustache. This is an entirely inappropriate length for what is essentially a home video of gay men playing with giant Barbie dolls. But I digress. Let us start with the “plot.”
Carrie Bradshaw: At the end of the first SATC movie (2008)—after eleventy decades of chasing his emotionally abusive jowls through the streets of Manhattan—Carrie finally marries Mr. Big, the man of her shallow, self-obsessed dreams. It has now been two years since their nuptials. Carrie already hates it. She hates that he sits on the couch. She hates that he eats noodles out of a take-out box. She hates that he wants to spend quality time with her in their incredibly expensive and gaudy apartment. She hates that he bought her an enormous television. When Big suggests that they spend a couple of days a week in separate apartments (they own TWO apartments, because life is hard!), Carrie screeches, “Is this because I’m a bitch wife who nags you?” Congratulations. You have answered your own question.
Miranda Redhairlawyerface: Miranda is a lawyer who has red hair. She also has a child. As a working woman, Miranda is forced to miss every single one of her child’s incessant science fairs (as though children know anything of science!). Also, her lawyer boss is a cartoon dick. Miranda quits her job, and everyone is much happier. This is because women should not work. It is terrible for the children.
Charlotte Goldsteinjewyjewsomethingsomethingblatt: Life for Charlotte is unbelievably difficult. As a wealthy stay-at-home mom with two children and a live-in, full-time nanny, she sometimes has to bake cupcakes! Also, one time her little child got finger paint on a piece of vintage cloth. Therefore, Charlotte cannot stop crying. “How do the women without help do it?” Charlotte (crying) asks Miranda. “I have no fucking idea,” Miranda replies. Then they toast their disgusting glasses of pink syrup. To “them.” To the “women without help.” “If I wasn’t rich, I’d definitely just kill myself right away with a knife!” says everyone in this movie without having to actually say it. Clink!
Samantha Jones: I told you we are never to speak of this.
In order to escape their various imaginary problems, our intrepid foursome traipses off to dark, exotic Abu Dhabi (“I’ve always been fascinated by the Middle East—desert moons, Scheherazade, magic carpets!”). When they arrive, Carrie, because she is a professional writer, announces, “Oh, Toto—I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore!” Each woman is immediately assigned an extra from Disney’s Aladdin to spoon-feed her warm cinnamon milk in their $22,000-per-night hotel suite. Things seem to be going great. But very quickly, the SATC brain trust notices that it’s not all swarthy man-slaves and flying carpets in Abu Dhabi! In fact, Abu Dhabi is crawling with Muslim women—and not one of them is dressed like a super-liberated diamond-encrusted fucking clown!!! Oppression! OPPRESSION!!!
This will not stand. Samantha, being the prostitute sexual revolutionary that she is, rages against the machine by publicly grabbing the engorged penis of a man she dubs “Lawrence of My-Labia.” When the locals complain (having repeatedly asked Samantha to cover her nipples and mons pubis in the way of local custom), Samantha removes most of her clothes in the middle of the spice bazaar, throws condoms in the faces of the angry and bewildered crowd, and screams, “I AM A WOMAN! I HAVE SEX!” Thus, traditional Middle Eastern sexual mores are upended and sexism is stoned to death in the town square.
At sexism’s funeral (which takes place in a mysterious, incense-shrouded chamber of international sisterhood), the women of Abu Dhabi remove their black robes and veils to reveal—this is not a joke—the same hideous, disposable, criminally expensive shreds of cloth and feathers that hang from Carrie et al.’s emaciated goblin shoulders. Muslim women: Under those craaaaaaay-zy robes, they’re just as vapid and obsessed with physical beauty and meaningless material concerns as us! Feminism! Fuck yeah!
If this is what modern womanhood means, then just fucking veil me and sew up all my holes. Good night. 
Find Lindy West every day on Slog, The Stranger‘s hot-fudge-covered blog.
What is the lubrication level of Samantha Jones’s 52-year-old vagina? and Samantha’s vagina is doing fine.
I love this! I think that to some extent this does sum up half of the content matter of this film. West provides a fine critical review and a fine feminist critique. I like her humour given that one cannot take the film seriously and therefore is not deserving of a serious/respectable review.
I do find her final statement a little worrying though “If this is what modern womanhood means, then just fucking veil me and sew up all my holes. Good night.” Whilst one is supposed to take this with tongue and cheek, I still can’t help feeling that this reinforces the stereotypes that the film affirms and her tone is rather like that of the characters that she is scrutinising. I do like her connection between feminism, materialism, vanity and sexual promiscuity. While the film aggressively tries to take on the issue of oppression for middle eastern women, the film inadvertently does more to highlight problems with so called western ideals of female liberation, and more importantly their priorities and skewed modes of thinking in comparison to their middle eastern counterparts (whose feminism one can argue is more concerned with modesty and surrenders itself for higher causes such as religion as opposed to taking advantage or the ability and desire to wear as little as possible). For me this highlights a type of feminist sickness/bi polarism within self proclaimed western women. As such, whilst feminism is traditionally associated and concerned with women within the economic and sexual realms, we have to question to what degree has this cost us in terms of our moral and spiritual selves.
I was surprised myself by the political rhetoric of this film, but having said that, it is a film that one is not meant to get too involved in and therefore any ideology put forward cannot be taken as either representative or valid. Therefore, one expects misrepresentations etc to occur. As such, to some extent, even writing a review of this nature is acknowledging the film more than it deserves . The feminist ideology is completely flawed and one can only expect that to be the case when we are looking at a film made by people that really don’t possess the level of sophistication or the motivation to bring forward more valid representations or purposeful arguments of women from cultures outside America. After all, what benefit would that provide to the films audience and how else can the dichotomy and paradoxes of these two clashing civilizations be portrayed? To make it simple, I don’t think it’s viewers are concerned with the fair and equal representation of Western and Eastern ideals of feminism or feminism in general, so any reviewer cannot take offence of it’s nature too harshly. To be honest, viewers mostly want to check out the men, see shiny handbags and if anything else be shown the great liberation western women experience in not having to wear the veil compared to their eastern counterparts.
In conclusion, I think that the film is certainly guilty of painting a very narrow, Eurocentric and Westernised perspective of feminism that only highlights the ‘crisis’ of westernised women in their understanding and assertion of what it means to be a free woman in a secular society. Whilst we may have the material and social freedoms that many of our suffragette sisters fought for, I am sure that their is something to be said about Eastern forms of feminism that we in the western world still refuse to acknowledge. In short there is a thing or two these sisters of ours can teach us. As the film highlights one could argue that there are many examples where our so called liberation has come at the cost our modesty which has given way to a higher than thou attitude, creating a sort of neo-imperialist feminism. Let us hope then – that if this film can give us anything of substance – that it teaches the common woman to open her eyes beyond the Neo Liberal agenda. Let us hope that for the common western woman (unlike those portrayed in the film)her liberated status goes beyond material aspirations – such as her desire to own something from Dolce and Gabbana.
I hope you are well, I have had a rant and it is below. I guess once I started I couldn’t stop and I have posted it on the sight lol……
What is the lubrication level of Samantha Jones’s 52-year-old vagina? and Samantha’s vagina is doing fine.
I love this! I think that to some extent this does sum up half of the content matter of this film. West provides a fine critical review and a fine feminist critique. I like her humour given that one cannot take the film seriously and therefore is not deserving of a serious/respectable review.
I do find her final statement a little worrying though “If this is what modern womanhood means, then just fucking veil me and sew up all my holes. Good night.” Whilst one is supposed to take this with tongue and cheek, I still can’t help feeling that this reinforces the stereotypes that the film affirms and her tone is rather like that of the characters that she is scrutinising. I do like her connection between feminism, materialism, vanity and sexual promiscuity. While the film aggressively tries to take on the issue of oppression for middle eastern women, the film inadvertently does more to highlight problems with so called western ideals of female liberation, and more importantly their priorities and skewed modes of thinking in comparison to their middle eastern counterparts (whose feminism one can argue is more concerned with modesty and surrenders itself for higher causes such as religion as opposed to taking advantage or the ability and desire to wear as little as possible). For me this highlights a type of feminist sickness/bi polarism within self proclaimed western women. As such, whilst feminism is traditionally associated and concerned with women within the economic and sexual realms, we have to question to what degree has this cost us in terms of our moral and spiritual selves.
I was surprised myself by the political rhetoric of this film, but having said that, it is a film that one is not meant to get too involved in and therefore any ideology put forward cannot be taken as either representative or valid. Therefore, one expects misrepresentations etc to occur. As such, to some extent, even writing a review of this nature is acknowledging the film more than it deserves . The feminist ideology is completely flawed and one can only expect that to be the case when we are looking at a film made by people that really don’t possess the level of sophistication or the motivation to bring forward more valid representations or purposeful arguments of women from cultures outside America. After all, what benefit would that provide to the films audience and how else can the dichotomy and paradoxes of these two clashing civilizations be portrayed? To make it simple, I don’t think it’s viewers are concerned with the fair and equal representation of Western and Eastern ideals of feminism or feminism in general, so any reviewer cannot take offence of it’s nature too harshly. To be honest, viewers mostly want to check out the men, see shiny handbags and if anything else be shown the great liberation western women experience in not having to wear the veil compared to their eastern counterparts.
In conclusion, I think that the film is certainly guilty of painting a very narrow, Eurocentric and Westernised perspective of feminism that only highlights the ‘crisis’ of westernised women in their understanding and assertion of what it means to be a free woman in a secular society. Whilst we may have the material and social freedoms that many of our suffragette sisters fought for, I am sure that their is something to be said about Eastern forms of feminism that we in the western world still refuse to acknowledge. In short there is a thing or two these sisters of ours can teach us. As the film highlights one could argue that there are many examples where our so called liberation has come at the cost our modesty which has given way to a higher than thou attitude, creating a sort of neo-imperialist feminism. Let us hope then – that if this film can give us anything of substance – that it teaches the common woman to open her eyes beyond the Neo Liberal agenda. Let us hope that for the common western woman (unlike those portrayed in the film)her liberated status goes beyond material aspirations – such as her desire to own something from Dolce and Gabbana.
Holy shit, this has to be one of the best reviews I have ever read! Haven’t laughed this hard in a while. Thanks!
Entry in a history book, 2100 AD. Feminism – a confused nihilistic political movement of the late 20th/early 21st century, which witnessed the developed world descend, for a period, into a hostile and malleable dolls house for the infantile, narcissistic, fantasies of large numbers of western women and their left wing supporters. search in rapidshare download
I agree.
Get over yourselves everyone. It’s a movie, it’s funny, it’s lame, it’s controversial, it’s feel good and it’s not for everyone. Who cares?
Why do we even have movie critics?
We cannot please all the people all the time. Choose what you want to watch. If you like it, great. If you don’t, too bad.
Too many people rely on other peoples opinions to make their minds up. Get a life, decide for yourself.
Don’t really care what others think of a movie, as long as I enjoyed it.
I happened to catch the director of this film on the daily show. He himself seemed pretty funny. Also totally unaware of just how shallow the whole thing was. The clip they showed was particularly embarrassing.
“This is because women should not work. It is terrible for the children.”
They got that part right.
Lindy is probably a fat, ugly, dyke looking loser who could never ever even fit into designer clothes because they don’t carry her size.
In additon, go sew up all your holes, because I bet no one wants to go anywhere near them….
HAHAHA-
So, if you don’t care a hoot-
Why are so many of you seeing the movie in the first place/ renting it on DVD so you don’t have to ‘pay’ to see it in the movies (SATC1).
And then finally- bothered to read all about it and bag it in a blog-
Just let those who enjoy it- do simply that!
Brilliant!
I’m sick of everyone ragging on SATC. Yeah it’s silly, but isn’t basically everything that comes out of hollywood? I don’t understand why everyone decides to demoralize every single thing about SATC because it’s one of the few successful franchises focusing entirely on women. There’s so many things just as cartoony about all male casts and people don’t get so up in arms about it! There are many more vapid movies about men and their greed and the constant search for sexual dominance. So yeah, SATC might be frivolous and silly and not exactly a step in the right direction, but people’s reaction to it is the really telling part of where women stand.
Amazing review! Lindy West, Cheers
@65 I could follow that train of thought if somebody was running around screaming about how oppressed nuns are when they take the veil. The minute I see somebody running around screaming about that then maybe I’ll think differently. For now, as I watch my good friend wear the hijba, go to school, aspire to be a doctor, date, and do whatever she wants I find it hard to believe that it’s oppressive. Especially when she chose it for herself. But you’re probably right…because you know everything right? You and your millions of Muslim friends and all.
I’m with Quacky. Love you Lindy West, just love you.
I’m in the minority, a 52-year old sexually active lesbian who needs my fluff. I found the movie affirming, silly, and at least showed me women my age–not often around in film. I am not horified by other women’s vagina’s, leathery skin, and such. The body and aging, is comedic, as Shakespeare knew. And for those younger–lust and love and beauty do not leave with menopause; I’m sorry feminism never imparted this to y’all.
This woman is a hero.
I had this pain in my being after watching this film, but could not clearly articulate just how hideous this film was (if you can call it that, I just tend to refer to it as the murder of all women’s dignity personified!).
But Ms West pin-pointed exactly why I (a liberal Muslim girl from London, though that doesnt make a difference as it should offend all humans) wanted to tear out my insides to stop the bile boiling over out of utter disgust for this horrid offence on all that mankind has achieved! And I probably would have, had my sister not been the one to pay for the tickets. She still can’t look at herself in the mirror out of pure shame.
So thank you Ms West and the many other writers (both men and women) who have simply reviewed this monstrosity for exactly what it was….. a pile of pure wasteful sewage (as even shit has its usage). Take care all
May have already been said, but I didn’t find the “gay men with barbie dolls” comment very funny. In fact, it reeks of the same sort of cultural insensitivity found in the movie that you are reviewing.
Come on, Stranger. I thought you were better than this article. Poo slinging is still poo slinging.
I think you should blame this disaster on some gay men…not all gay men. Otherwise you end up critiquing one stereotype while perpetuating another.
Came across this following up a passing reference in an extended rant featured on BBC radio. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00lvdrj
I thought that was good. This is something else.
We are not worthy, we are not worthy…
I just read this again and it is still really, really, REALLY funny.
>then just fucking veil me and sew up all my holes
that phrase was choice – it summed it all up very well 🙂
Why are you so angry, Lindy? Sex and the City is a comedy. Can it be shallow? Yes. Does it address themes many women care about? Yes. Is it shameful to worry if you can balance a career and a child? To worry that your husband might cheat on you? To want to be considered sexy past your twenties? To yearn for a fulfilling career? To contemplate if marriage can truly make someone happy? I am an intelligent, well-informed woman who has 40 employees in a successful business. And sometimes I DO talk to my friends about men, sex, my job, and clothes. I feel no shame. I can talk about those parts of a woman’s life and not have to feel like an unworthy, shallow bitch. What do you talk about with your friends? And if the answer is only politics, relgion, etc: you lie. Also, Miranda left her job for ANOTHER JOB. Please pay attention to the movie if you’re going to review it. You just went in angry, watched angry, and spewed anger because this is the Stranger and it would by highly uncool to like Sex and the City. You knew what this was going to say before you even watched it. Lame.
Could Lindy West a pseudonym for Mel Gibson? This person has some serious issues with women.
I’m new to the realm of Lindy West, but I am capital G Grateful to have discovered it. The column on Gallagher was my gateway drug and Ms. West is now in my pantheon of great culture commentators. She is an American, female Charlie Brooker (one of my gods), so I mean that as high praise. And this column. Sweet fucking Jesusberries. Thank you, Ms. West. Thank. You.
I’m new to the realm of Lindy West, but I am capital G Grateful to have discovered it. The column on Gallagher was my gateway drug and Ms. West is now in my pantheon of great culture commentators. She is an American, female Charlie Brooker (one of my gods), so I mean that as high praise. And this column. Sweet fucking Jesusberries. Thank you, Ms. West. Thank. You.
Thank you, Lindy West, for being a voice of sanity in a culture that eats up this horror without bothering to notice just how insidious it is. I was raised by a single working mom and have had mostly female friends since adolescence (I simply find what they have to say a hell of a lot more interesting than most of what my fellow guys go on about) and by listening to all of them I think I’ve gained what I’ve been told is a better-than-average understanding of women (the lessons learned from them have helped my romantic life immeasurably). That said, this understanding of women is why I have been loudly against SATS since its inception and I’m always astonished when intelligent, savvy women tell me that I’m an asshole for “not getting it” and then practically crucify my for “killing the fantasy” by citing that the series only reinforces many of the incredibly negative stereotypes that are taken to heart by society at large. SATS is far from the “liberating” confection it thinks it is; in many ways it’s the estrogenic answer to the most vile of minstrelsy, only substituting women for blacks.
Sorry for the rant, but as a guy who has enjoyed many “chick flicks,” I really, really despise what the SATS franchise is putting out there and I wish the whole damned thing would just go away.
I think you have very valid points. However I find that the campy idea of the movie to make a few points. That we as older women, have worked and raised children and given our time, money and hearts to many people and things. We have earned the right to wear our six hundred dollar shoes with a ten dollar wal-mart sweater and we have earned the right to support the femisinism of non working mothers as well as working mothers. Having both had help and not I realize that working and non working mothers are stressed and we all break. But having friends or fairy tale trips to the mall might just pull us together enough to sing I am Woman and be proud of the idea that 50 years ago we did not have the choices or the chances to take the risks and make nor spend our own money. The parody makes a point. Keep up the great blog.
This review was released in May. It’s December, and I just reread it, LMAO. This never gets old!
Nancy Meyers should write and direct Sex & The City 3 and redeem the franchise.
Fantastic!!!!
Although I have been invited to and participated in one of the aforementioned female only parties where fashions are on display, the film made it look like some sort of dodgy strip tease for the New York girls when really its just a normal party where you take your abaya off at the door just like you would a coat. No weirdness.
Love your review though, absolutely fantastic 😀
I think this review is more famous than the film itself now. anyway, well said, this film is a disgrace that seems to insult every demographic possible. I have much better things to do with my life than watch SJP’s horse face and listen to samantha flaunting her haunted cave of a vagina for an hour and a half
The irony
Look at the add next to the review..lots of female ass. Can someone educate me, is that women’s lib or exploitation? I guess it depends whose looking.
Aint life grand
I live in Abu Dhabi, and I’m sorry to say that the movie portrayed it pretty accurately. The women here DO wear criminally expensive clothes under their abayas ( the name for the dark cloak). Also, the UAE refused to let the movie be filmed here, so Tunisia had to stand in. Why the producers wanted to help this fucked up sexist place ( FGM and spousal abuse are LEGAL here) generate more tourism dollars is beyond me.
OMG Thank you for this review. I just saw the movie on HBO. Worst movie ever. Shockingly bad. You nailed it in your review. Thanks again.
Oh great. Another bunch of assholes making me feel bad for wanting to pretend I’m in Oz for a while. Guess I’ll go back to obsessing about the death of the wetlands, the unrest in Israel, my son’s recent vaccinations, my daughter’s ingestion of pesticide and hormone filled foods, the mass in my sister’s breast, the lack of my sex drive, my Teflon-covered pans, cutbacks of ALL programs at the college where I work…here’s an idea: stop focusing so hard on these industries with more power than Christianity and maybe we can defuse thema little, get back to what they were originally intended for, brief amusement.
Zip it cunt.
Fantastic review, Lindy. Tell it like it is!
I was so insulted that the “writers” of SATC 2 found me so stupid to swallow such shit.
Then, even more disgusting, touting it as feminism. Fucking disgusting.
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Like a lot of other people here, I just came back to revisit this wonderful piece of wonderfulness. It brings tears to my eyes it’s so fucking great.
Seriously, what is wrong with Linda and most of you people who praise this article? It’s just a freakin movie! It’s meant to entertain not open up discussions on politics and religion. Maybe you guys should stick to documentaries and leave fiction to those who actually have a sense of humor.