by FM Lepore

Created on: June 30, 2008

The Manolos are out in full force, the Prada dresses tres' chic, Gucci, Stella McCarthy and let's not forget Vivienne Westwood's size zero wedding dress with a super size attitude! Yes, the girlfriends are back, Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte and mighty mouth Miranda. Those over-sexed, under-sexed, six figure income gals romping about in New York City searching for more labels and true love are back on the Silver Screen.

Having spent the good part of the decade watching the sex-charades of the fashionista four, I wasn't sure I could settle down in a noisy theatre with hordes of women all claiming to be girlfriends, all sans their boyfriends, husband and/or dates for an evening of girl bonding or if we leave the sex in the mix, girl bondage. I can't say that the movie delivered a one-two punch, certainly not in the same way the HBO series did throughout the six years on television.

I was less interested in Carrie's relationship with the uncommitted BIG', but more interested in her personal growth as a writer/editor. I was not concerned with Charlotte's love making schedule as much as I was concerned with her mothering techniques. I could care less about Samantha's fascination with nine inches and using her body as a sushi serving board. What would have engrossed me about Samantha was a story line about her surviving cancer, still enamored and living with the man who supported her throughout her illness, still working things out and still loving and embracing life the way Samantha knew how. Instead I saw a woman approaching fifty, too wrapped up in her own legend, too absorbed in her own self importance and dare I say too wrapped up in sex! When the fashionista four were sitting in a diner talking about their sex starved lives, infidelity and hairless crotches, Samantha blurted that she was still with Smith because he supported her through cancer and chemotherapy, to which Carrie commented that "cancer" and "chemo" were allegorically the "death" of Samantha and Smith.

The excitement no longer there, the sex tapes and thrill of the chase gone, the trysts in the closets, bathroom, kitchen, office, stairwell and fire escapes were a thing of the past.Now enter in Miranda, the torrid tongue girlfriend whose husband Steve slept with another woman because Miranda appeared, well, too wrapped up in Miranda.

I have to admit, I never really cared much for Miranda. I found her too self deprecating, self loathing and certainly lacking the confidence of a successful attorney whose earnings were well beyond six figures when the series was still in its infancy. I know there are many women who won't admit that they would have forgiven Steve in the first two minutes of the scene in the movie, I know I would have. After all, show me a man who treats his mother as well as Steve does and I'll show you a man that will rub your feet and back after an arduous day at the office. And don't get me started about Miranda's spouting venom to John, Mr. Big, the night before the wedding of the decade.

I thought women were suppose to "wake up and smell the coffee" at some point in their lives? I thought the notion of having it all was nothing more than a fairy tale concocted by Hollywood, the media and the fanshionista wannabes. I thought that at some point in the movie Sex In the City would become Success In The City. Then again, that all depends on your interpretation of success, life, love and the pursuit of happiness wearing Jimmy Choo's, Juicy Couture and a bird's nest in your hair.

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