Sex and the City 2 leaves me feeling empty and shallow

As I sat through 147 minutes of the drivel that was Sex and the City 2 at the midnight screening on Wednesday night, I quietly pondered something—what did I ever see in these women?

To say that I was a fan of the show is an understatement; in fact I have the glammed-up pink box set of all six seasons to prove it. For years I watched Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte live and love unapologetically in the streets of New York City. Manhattan was their playground, and I couldn’t wait for each week’s playdate.

I watched to see what Carrie wore, who Samantha fucked, what made Charlotte blush, and what pissed Miranda off. I loved each of them and didn’t care that they were more concerned about their fake nipples than the state of the world.

But then something changed—I had been blinded by the Manolos and the couture.

Now ten years later, I realize just how shallow this relationship has been and the second film finally made me see that even though the ladies are getting older, they certainly aren’t getting much wiser.

If this movie showed me one thing, it’s that the ladies should stick to what they know best—shoes, sex, and New York City. The foursome's excursion to the unfamiliar terrains of the Middle East (Abu Dhabi) reveals what is perhaps the worst part of this film—the blatant ignorance of another culture. I didn’t expect the movie to take us into the war-torn and poverty-stricken reality that is the Middle East, but I was hoping for just a little more respect.

Instead what I got were four privileged white women with very little interest in anything other than themselves. Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) continues to whine about Mr. Big (Chris Noth), and Samantha (Kim Cattrall) doesn’t grasp why a 52-year-old woman humping the air with condoms in hand is inappropriate no matter where you are. Meanwhile, an exceptionally dumbed-down Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) attempts to learn the language but fails miserably when explaining that han gee means yes in Arabic—it actually means yes in Punjabi.

But hey, what’s a little screw up in language? It’s not like anyone will notice, right? (I wonder if the filmmakers ever gave a second thought to the Arabic- and Punjabi-speaking audience that pay to watch their poor excuse of a film.)

I felt insulted at what little respect the movie had for the country it had chosen to portray—something they had no problems with when the backdrop was New York.

A movie with a cast of supposedly strong women could have done a better job incorporating the voice of Muslim women. Not only do none of the women in Abu Dhabi dare speak, but when we finally do encounter the ones that do, you wish that they would have just kept them quiet. There is no cultural accuracy being portrayed here; instead, it’s another group of women just as consumed with all things superficial as their American counterparts.

I understand that unraveling the complexities of any culture is difficult for a film, but this uninspired movie and its infinitely lazy writing doesn’t even try. It was obvious to me that the show no longer cared about empowering women or guiding a new generation in the right direction.

Yes, I know from the very beginning the show made no qualms about what they were about. Men, shoes, sex, shoes, babies, and, oh yeah, did I mention the shoes? I don’t fault the show for that, but I do reserve the right to walk away from this empty relationship.

In the words of Carrie herself, “I'm looking for love. Real love. Ridiculous, inconvenient, consuming, can't-live-without-each-other love”.

And I don’t think it’s here.