Like most men and most sensible women, I’ve always found “Sex In the City” to be extremely self-indulgent and stupid. (Plus the cast is waaay too old for this shit) But I’m quite amused by various reviews in a “enemy of enemy” sense. Like a crude drawing of Mohammad, a movie like this likely won’t persuasive, but it might be fun.
Wajahat Ali for Slate.com:
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. Historian Bernard Lewis, the 93-year-old Hall of Fame Orientalist and author of such nuanced gems as “The Arabs in History” and “Islam and the West,” would probably die of priapism if he saw this movie. It’s like the cinematic progeny of “Not Without My Daughter” and “Arabian Nights” with a makeover by Valentino. Forget the oppressed women of Abu Dhabi. Let’s buy more bling for the burqa!
Stephen Farber for the Hollywood Reporter:
…she and her friends run up against the puritanical and misogynistic culture of the Middle East. The rather scathing portrayal of Muslim society no doubt will stir controversy, especially in a frothy summer entertainment, but there’s something bracing about the film’s saucy political incorrectness. Or is it politically correct? “SATC 2” is at once proudly feminist and blatantly anti-Muslim, which means that it might confound liberal viewers.
The P.C. left has an either/or proposition. Feminism or appeasement of Islamic culture. They can have one, but they can’t have both.
