EveryWoman And Sex And The City

I think I’m the next to the last woman in the country to see Sex and The City. Better late than never, I say. I finally saw it and I’ve been racking my brain to figure out what I could say about it that was brilliant, and profound. I mean it’s not really a brilliant, profound movie is it? If you’re up to here with commentary on it, I won’t hold it against you if you stop right here. No spoilers here though if you decide to read on and you’re one of the few who haven’t yet seen it.

The truth is I liked it a lot. It wasn’t always that way.

I was a slow convert to being a fan. I did not watch the show during its original airing, I felt it was beneath me somehow, way too popular. I only caught it later in reruns and even then I thought those girls were awful, awful and shallow. I know I’m being a hard ass, give the girls a break, they were 30 somethings, girls just want to have fun, for God’s sake!

But, slyly and insidiously, they crept under my skin until I would catch myself on Wednesday evenings arranging my schedule to watch the latest rerun. Still telling myself they were terrible, but going out of my way to watch the show. Unh hunh. By the last episode, I had melted and was proud of all of them for showing discernible and quite respectable personal growth.

Their fashion-saturated, hip hanging out, cocktail sipping, glamming it lives are just irresistible. How could you not be seduced by it? Weeellll...that’s a different post, so onward.

Why do they have such universal girl appeal, to young and more mature alike? It IS the girlfriends for life thing, no doubt about it. Where would we be without our girlfriends? And, I think it’s because, despite their completely unrealistic lifestyles--it would take several tens of thousands of monthly dollars to live in NYC the way they do—still, at bottom, they are just regular girls like the rest of us trying to figure out love and life. Making just as many mistakes as the rest of us, suffering heartaches just like the rest of us, struggling to maintain their sense of identity in the face of these crazy, mystifying things we call relationships.

Granted they are doing that more glamorously and beautifully coiffed and coutured than the rest of us could hope for, but nonetheless....

That’s as brilliant as I could get, sorry. So now, let’s turn to the completely girly, gossipy part!

I mean, the clothes! The stupendously fashionable, clothing–as-art, over the top clothes made my mouth hang open at every scene change. I’m not a fashionista by ANY stretch, but honestly, I LOVED THOSE CLOTHES AND ACCESSORIES!! If I ever manage to look even remotely fashionable, I usually run out of steam (and money) at the accessorizing stage of things. Which is why nobody would ever mistake me for even a fashionista wannabe.

The girls all looked absolutely FABulous, even better than in the TV show, didn’t ya’ll think? It was gratifying to see Kim Cattrall play the hottest 50ish woman on the screen in recent memory (Rene Russo in The Thomas Crown Affair was a close second). I think they must have put all four through a 6 month daily training regimen prior to even beginning to shoot. What would it be like for your JOB to be working out with your trainer 2 hours every day, getting your hair done, visiting the aesthetician for a little Botox, and all the rest? I'll certainly never know :)

Anyway, enough of that. Bottom line is, I can forgive the outrageously unrealistic, glam lifestyle portrayal and impossible stereotypes of beauty they present, because the bottom line is, those girls manage to pull at our heartstrings.

They couldn’t do that if they didn’t have something of the Every Woman in them.