| Sex and the City | |
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Film poster |
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| Directed by | Michael Patrick King |
| Produced by | Daniel Dubiecki Jeffrey Clifford Michael Patrick King Sarah Jessica Parker Darren Star John Melfi |
| Screenplay by | Michael Patrick King |
| Based on | Sex and the City by Candace Bushnell Sex and the City by Darren Star |
| Narrated by | Sarah Jessica Parker |
| Starring | Sarah Jessica Parker Kim Cattrall Kristin Davis Cynthia Nixon Chris Noth Jennifer Hudson Candice Bergen |
| Music by | Aaron Zigman (Music) Randy Edelman (Score) John Williams (Songs) |
| Cinematography | John Thomas |
| Editing by | Conrad Buff Dana E. Glauberman Kevin Stitt Michael Berenbaum |
| Studio | Cold Spring Pictures HBO Films The Montecito Picture Company |
| Distributed by | New Line Cinema |
| Release date(s) | May 28, 2008 (UK) May 30, 2008 (US) |
| Running time | 145 minutes 151 minutes (extended cut) |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $65 million |
| Box office | $415,253,641 |
Sex and the City is a 2008 American blue romantic comedy film adaptation of the HBO comedy series of the same name (itself based on the novel of the same name by Candace Bushnell) about four female friends: Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker), Samantha Jones (Kim Cattrall), Charlotte York Goldenblatt (Kristin Davis), and Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon), dealing with their lives as single women in New York City. The series often portrayed frank discussions about romance and sexuality.
The world premiere took place at Poster Square, London, on May 15, 2008 and premiered on May 28, 2008 in the United Kingdom and May 30, 2008 in the United States. A sequel, Sex and the City 2, was released in 2010.
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Set four years after the events of the series finale, the film begins with a montage of Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Samantha (Kim Cattrall), Charlotte (Kristin Davis) and Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) walking through New York City and a recap of what happened in the TV series as well as what happened between the season six finale and the film. It then jumps to Carrie and Big (Chris Noth) viewing apartments with the intention of moving in together. Carrie falls in love with a penthouse suite far from their price range, which Big immediately agrees to pay for. However, Carrie experiences doubts over the wisdom of this arrangement, explaining that they are not married, and as such she would have no legal rights to their home in the event of a separation. She offers to sell her own apartment, and quelling her fears, Big suggests that they get married.
Samantha (Kim Cattrall) has relocated her business to Los Angeles to be close to Smith (Jason Lewis), who is now a prime-time television star. She finds her five-year-old relationship humdrum and yearns for her old life—especially after witnessing the public sexcapades of Dante, the hot new neighbor. She takes every opportunity to fly East to be with the other girls.
Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) finds that balancing her home, work, and social life ever the more difficult, and confesses to the girls that she hasn’t had sex with Steve (David Eigenberg) in six months. She is devastated when Steve reveals he has slept with another woman, and immediately separates from him.
After an argument with Steve at the rehearsal dinner, Miranda, still upset about Steve's indiscretion, tells Big bluntly that he and Carrie are crazy to be getting married, as marriage ruins everything. On the day of the ceremony, Big cannot go through with it, but repeated attempts to telephone Carrie fail. A devastated Carrie flees the wedding. Big changes his mind and intercepts Carrie as he sees her limousine drive away. Carrie furiously attacks Big with her bouquet while he earns scathing looks from Miranda and Charlotte. The four women subsequently take the honeymoon that Carrie had booked to Mexico, where they de-stress and collect themselves.
Upon her return to New York City, Carrie hires an assistant, Louise (Jennifer Hudson), to help her move back into her old apartment and manage her administration. Charlotte learns she is pregnant after a visit to her doctor. Miranda eventually confesses to Carrie about what happened during the night of the rehearsal dinner, and the two have a brief falling out. After reflecting on the argument she had with Carrie, Miranda agrees to attend couples counseling with Steve, and they are eventually able to reconcile. Samantha begins over-eating to keep from cheating on Smith with Dante, but eventually realizes that their relationship is simply not working, and that she needs to put herself first. The two break up, and she moves back to New York. Charlotte for several months is concerned that something might happen to the baby, because she feels her life seems to be too perfect.
A surprise encounter with Big at a restaurant leaves Charlotte so outraged that she goes into labor. Big drives her to the hospital, and waits until baby Rose is born, hoping to see Carrie. Harry passes on the message that Big would like her to call him, and that he has written to her frequently, but never received a reply. Carrie searches her correspondence, before realizing that Louise has kept his e-mails password-protected from her, after Carrie earlier announced she wished to sever all communication with him. She finds that he has sent her dozens of letters copied from the book she showed him in the weeks before their wedding, Love Letters of Great Men, Vol. 1, culminating with one of his own where he apologizes for screwing it up and promises to love her forever.
One hour before the locks are due to be changed on their shared penthouse apartment, Carrie travels to the home Big had bought for them to collect a pair of blue Manolo Blahnik shoes she had left there. She finds Big in the walk-in closet he had built for her, and the moment she sees him, her anger at his betrayal dissipates. She runs into his arms and they share a passionate kiss. After they have spent the final hour in their apartment together making up, talking and apologizing to one another, Big proposes to Carrie properly, using one of her diamond-encrusted shoes in place of a ring. They later marry alone, in a simple wedding in New York City Hall, with Carrie dressed in the original dress she had bought in a vintage shop and the blue Manolos. After Big kisses the bride, he whispers into her ear "Ever thine. Ever mine. Ever ours," a line by Ludwig van Beethoven Carrie read to him from Love Letters of Great Men, Vol. 1 earlier in the film. They hold a get-together at a local diner with their friends. The film ends with the four women around a table in a restaurant, sipping cosmopolitans, and celebrating Samantha's fiftieth birthday, with Carrie making a toast to the next fifty.
At the end of Sex and the City's run in February 2004, there were indications of a movie being considered following the series. HBO announced that Michael Patrick King was working on a possible script for the movie which he would direct.[1] Later that year, Kim Cattrall declined to work on the project citing reasons that the script and the start date were overly prolonged and she decided to take other offers at hand.[2] As a result, the immediate follow-up idea for the movie were dropped.
It was in mid-2007 that the plans for making the movie were announced again. This reportedly resulted after Cattrall's conditions being accepted along with a future HBO series.[3] In May 2007 the project was halted after HBO decided it was no longer in a position to finance the movie on its own. The project was pitched within the Time Warner family (owners of HBO) and was picked by sister concern New Line Cinema.
In February 2007 it was officially announced that a sequel will be made including all four actresses and writer-director Michael Patrick King.[4]
The film was prominently shot in New York between September–December 2007.[5][6] The locations included a number of places around Manhattan and a certain portion was shot in Steiner Studios and Silvercup Studios. The shooting was continually interrupted by paparazzi and onlookers with the security and police authorities employed in order to control the crowd.[7] Efforts were taken in order to keep the plot of the film in secrecy, including shooting multiple endings.[8] As a defense strategy, scenes shot in public or in presence of number of extras were termed by Ryan Jonathan Healy and the main cast as "dream sequences."[9]
As in the TV series, fashion played a significant role in plot and production of the movie. Over 300 ensembles were used over the course of entire film.[10] Patricia Field, who created costume designs for the series, also undertook the job in the film.[11] Field has stated that she initially was ambivalent to do the film, for monetary and creative reasons.[12] Field rose to fame particularly after designing for the series from 1998 to 2004, wherein she popularized the concept of using designer clothes with day-to-day fashion.
While dressing the characters for the film, Field decided to stay clear from the latest fashion trends defining the characters and instead focused on the evolution of individual character and the actor portraying it, over the last four years.[12] While Samantha's dressing was influenced by American TV soap opera Dynasty (see Nolan Miller), Jackie Kennedy was the inspiration for Charlotte's clothes. Miranda, according to Field, has evolved the most from the series in terms of fashion. This was influenced significantly by development in actress Cynthia Nixon in past years.[12][13]
The soundtrack was released May 27, 2008 by New Line Records. The soundtrack includes new songs by Fergie and Jennifer Hudson (who plays Carrie's assistant in the film).
The film's soundtrack debuted at #2 on the Billboard 200, the highest debut for a multi-artist theatrical film soundtrack since 2005's Get Rich or Die Tryin',[16] and debuting at #6 on the UK Albums Chart, selling to date more than 55,000 copies.
A second soundtrack, Sex and the City: Volume 2, was released on September 23, 2008, coinciding with the film's DVD release, featuring the British singers Estelle, Craig David, Mutya Buena and Amy Winehouse. It also featured Janet Jackson, Ciara, and Elijah Kelley.
In December 2008, the orchestral score for the film was released, Sex And The City - The Score, containing 18 tracks of original score composed, co-orchestrated, and conducted by Aaron Zigman. Whilst the order of the tracks does not correspond directly to the order that the score is heard in the film, the score soundtrack contains almost every single piece of score that is present in the film.
The film's international premiere took place on Monday, May 12, 2008 at Odeon West End in London's Leicester Square to the audience of 1700.[17] It was next premiered at Sony Center at Potsdamer Platz in Berlin on May 15.[18] The film had its New York City premiere at Radio City Music Hall on Tuesday, May 27, 2008.[19]
The film has experienced commercial success. Opening in 3,285 theaters, the film made $26.93 million in the US and Canada on its first day. The three-day opening weekend total was $57,038,404, aggregating $17,363 per theater.[20] The film recorded the biggest opening ever for an R-rated comedy and for a romantic comedy,[21] and also for a film starring all women.[22] As of March, 2010, the film has grossed $152,647,258 at the US and Canadian box office, and $262,605,528 in other markets, bringing the worldwide total gross revenue to $415,252,786, making it the highest-grossing romantic comedy of 2008.[20]
The film received mixed reviews from critics. The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 49% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 173 reviews with the consensus that "Sex and the City loses steam in the transition to the big screen, but will still thrill fans of the show."[23] Metacritic gave the film a normalized average score of 53% based on 38 reviews.[24]
Brian Lowry of Variety said the film "...feels a trifle half-hearted",[25] while Carina Chocano of the Los Angeles Times stated "[the film] tackles weighty issues with grace but is still very funny". She praised Michael Patrick King's work saying very few movies "are willing to go to such dark places while remaining a comedy in the Shakespearean sense".[26] Colin Bertram of the New York Daily News dubbed the film a "great reunion", and was happy with the return of "The 'Oh, my God, they did not just do that!' moments, the nudity, the swearing, the unabashed love of human frailty and downright wackiness".[27] The Chicago Tribune's Jessica Reeves described it as "Witty, effervescent and unexpectedly thoughtful."[28] Michael Rechtshaffen at The Hollywood Reporter praised the performances of the four leading ladies and said the film kept the essence of the series, but resembled a super-sized episode.[29]
Manohla Dargis of The New York Times found the film "a vulgar, shrill, deeply shallow — and, at 2 hours and 22 turgid minutes, overlong — addendum to a show",[30] while The Daily Telegraph's Sukhdev Sandhu panned the film saying "[the ladies] have become frozen, Spice Girls-style types - angsty, neurotic, predatory, princess - rather than individuals who might evolve or surprise us".[31] Rick Groen of The Globe and Mail slammed the film commenting on lack of script and adding that the characters "don't perform so much as parade, fixed in their roles as semi-animated clothes hangers on a cinematic runway". He gave the film zero stars out of four.[32] Anthony Lane, a film critic for The New Yorker since 1993, called the film a "superannuated fantasy posing as a slice of modern life"; he noted that "almost sixty years after All About Eve, which also featured four major female roles, there is a deep sadness in the sight of Carrie and friends defining themselves not as Bette Davis, Anne Baxter, Celeste Holm, and Thelma Ritter did—by their talents, their hats, and the swordplay of their wits—but purely by their ability to snare and keep a man....All the film lacks is a subtitle: "The Lying, the Bitch, and the Wardrobe."[33]
Ramin Setoodeh of Newsweek speculated that some of the criticism for Sex is derived possibly from sexism: "when you listen to men talk about it (and this is coming from the perspective of a male writer), a strange thing happens. The talk turns hateful. Angry. Vengeful. Annoyed...Is this just poor sportsmanship? I can't help but wonder—cue the Carrie Bradshaw voiceover here—if it's not a case of 'Sexism in the City.' Men hated the movie before it even opened...Movie critics, an overwhelmingly male demographic, gave it such a nasty tongue lashing you would have thought they were talking about an ex-girlfriend...The movie might not be Citizen Kane—which, for the record, is a dude flick—but it's incredibly sweet and touching."[34]
The movie featured on worst of 2008 lists including that of The Times,[35] Mark Kermode, The New York Observer,[36] The Tart[37] and The Daily Telegraph.[38]
New Line Home Entertainment released a DVD and Blu-ray release of Sex and the City: The Movie on September 23, 2008.[39] There are two versions of the film released in the US on home video. There is a standard, single disc theatrical cut (the version seen in theaters) which comes in fullscreen or widescreen (in separate editions). Both discs are the same, except for the movie presentation. The only features are an audio commentary, deleted scenes, and a digital copy of the film. Also released on the same day as the standard edition is the two-disc special edition, which adds six minutes of footage to the film, along with the commentary from the standard edition DVD and a second disc that contains bonus features, as well as a digital copy of the widescreen theatrical version of the film. The only version of the film released on Blu-Ray is the two-disc extended cut, which is identical to the DVD version of the extended cut.
On December 9, 2008 New Line Home Entertainment released a third edition of Sex and the City: The Movie. This edition is a 4-disc set entitled Sex and the City: The Movie (The Wedding Collection). The 4-disc set features the previously released extended cut of the film on the first disc, the second disc has the bonus features from the extended cut and three additional featurettes, the third disc holds even more special features, and the fourth is a music CD with songs inspired by the movie, including the alternative mix of Fergie's "Labels or Love" from the beginning of the film. The set also comes with an exclusive hardcover book, featuring photos and quotes from the movie, and a numbered certificate of authenticity in a pink padded box.
A fourth edition was also released in Australia. This set contained the two discs from the Sex and the City: The Movie Special Edition and a bonus 'Sex and the City Inspired' Clutch Bag. This clutch being black in colour in a tile or snake skin material.
The DVD has reached the #1 on the UK DVD Top Chart and is the fastest selling DVD release of 2008 in the UK, selling over 920,000 copies in one week. It is way ahead of the 700,000 copies sold for Ratatouille which was, prior to Sex and the City's release, the best selling DVD of 2008 in the UK. Although the record has since been beaten by Mamma Mia!
After months of speculation, the cast confirmed in February 2009 that a sequel was in the works. Filming began in August 2009 for a May 27, 2010 release.[40] On 25 February 2009, an article from the website Female First, suggested that stylist Patricia Field had not yet been contracted to work on the sequel and may have been axed, however pictures of the cast filming in New York City recently show Field with them on set.[41][42] Jennifer Hudson has told sources that she would want to reprise her role as Carrie's assistant, Louise.[43]
The sequel officially began filming on September 1, 2009 and will continue until the end of 2009. Photos of all four leading women filming scenes around New York together and separately have emerged, featuring present-day scenes as well as a range of looks believed to be flashbacks from the earlier years of Carrie, Samantha, Miranda and Charlotte's long-standing friendships. Images of Samantha in a wedding dress have also been released.[44] Additionally, scenes featuring prominent characters such as Mr. Big, Magda, Smith Jerrod, Steve Brady and the children of Miranda and Charlotte have been filmed and photographed.
Oscar-winner Penélope Cruz has been reported to appear briefly as a banker.[45] In September 2009, American singer/actress Liza Minnelli confirmed to several media outlets that she will be appearing in a cameo role and that singer/actress Barbra Streisand will also appear. Singer/actress Bette Midler has been photographed on set and was speculated to play the role of Carrie's mother, which she denied, stating she was on the set to support her daughter who was working on the film's production. Teen pop star Miley Cyrus will have one scene where she appears at the premiere of Smith Jerrod's new film, wearing the same dress as Samantha. On October 17 several pictures of Miley filming the scene surfaced online.[46]
Kristen Davis revealed to MTV that the second Sex and the City film will be shorter than the first (which ran for over 2.5 hours) and feature fewer costume changes. However, she states that the production is bigger and that the cast and crew have been working long hours to ensure a quality outcome.
Filming progressed throughout late 2009 in September, October, November and December, with location shoots around New York City and internal shoots in New York City's Silvercup Studios (where the first film and television series were filmed). During these months, the main cast and crew (including all four leading ladies) spent six weeks in Morocco shooting pivotal scenes for the film.[47] Fan-favourite John Corbett was seen on location in Morocco, confirming his speculated involvement in the film as Aidan, who was last seen in 2003 in the television show's sixth season.[48] However, Corbett told Access Hollywood that he wasn't even in Morocco at the time of the filming and that the pictures were taken out of context.[49]
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