Sex and the City is an utterly iconic TV show that explored female relationships, friendships and found a permanent place in our hearts from the late ‘90s to early ‘00s. However, when the TV series made its foray into film, the cracks started to show – particularly when it comes to the 2010 flick Sex and the City 2.
The film was intended to be a sequel to the 2008 film Sex and the City and despite a budget of $95M, it received a measly score of 27/100 on Metacritic. However, bad reviews were just the start of it – Sex and the City 2 was also incredibly problematic.
Speaking of looking back at problematic films and TV shows, hear about how platforms are retrofitting them in 2020 below:
To begin, Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte and Miranda fly to Abu Dhabi – mentioning ‘magic carpets’ multiple times – before arriving at their luxury hotel and observing the local women in traditional dress. Miranda urges Samantha to cover up (who does – albeit reluctantly) and Carrie says she could “get into the head wrap” but “the veil across the mouth freaks me out.”
Later, when Samantha is talking about her butler, who she thinks is gay, she puts on a voice when impersonating him. “When I asked him his name, he said, ‘Abdul, like Paula,’” she said.
In another scene, Samantha’s handbag gets torn open in the suk and condoms spill out onto the ground. When the men around her start to judge, she says, “condoms! That’s right, I have sex!” This would not have gone down well had it happened in real life.
Salon’s Wajahat Ali wrote that Sex and the City 2 director Michael Patrick King’s “exquisitely tone-deaf movie is cinematic Viagra for Western cultural imperialists who still ignorantly and inaccurately paint the entire Middle East (and Iran) as a Shangri La in desperate need of liberation from ignorant, backward natives.”
“It’s hard to overstate the offensiveness of the fabulous four’s exquisitely tone-deaf trip to Abu Dhabi,” he added.
In a piece for the London Evening Standard, Andrew O’Hagan wrote that Sex and the City 2, “could be the most stupid, most racist, the most polluting and women-hating film of the year.”
Even Carrie Bradshaw herself understood why people at least hated the first Sex and the City film. During an interview at Vulture Festival in 2017, Sarah Jessica Parker said, “I understand, I actually get it.”
“I can see where we fell short on that movie, and I’m perfectly happy to say that publicly.”
It’s been 10 years since Sex and the City 2, but fans are still reeling from how tone-deaf the film really was. Hopefully it’s a lesson learned if Sex and the City 3 ever turns up on Hollywood’s horizon.
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