Okay, stole the last line of the title from a fantastic Anthony Lane review in The New Yorker of Sex and the City. Do we need to explain why you also shouldn't take your pretten daughter to see it?
10. It's R-rated
9. It's anti-working woman.
8. They scarily talk about sex constantly in front of a 3-year-old girl. (Charlotte's daughter). Call the Department of Social Services!
7. Rampant materialism/consumerism of the worst kind, but that's pretty obvious.
6. Good sex is always "porn" sex; bad sex is sex you have when you're a working woman and tired from taking care of your kids. Bad sex is one person on top of the other sex; good sex is posing for the camera sex or doing anything wild and crazy just to not be "normal." There's porn porn porn. Cheesy cheesy porn. Not erotica. Take for example especially the shot of the neighbor guy taking a shower at the end of the movie. We and Samantha peep at him. Hmmmmmm. After he's been shown having sex with a different woman every night, the only thing that could make him look sexy in the shower for me is giving him a bar of anti-bacterial soap and not even then.
5. It teaches girls that when a boyfriend or husband two-times you, you always share some of the responsibility. The way to healing is self-blame, forgiveness . . . and porn sex.
4. Most horribly, the movie adds Jennifer Hudson as an employee of Carrie Bradshaw who is shown to be "just like her" in her looking for love and labels! Yay, now Black women can hop on the COSMO train -- next stop Bloomingdales, after that Anorexia Lane.
3. The Traumarama moments. We wrote about this in Packaging Girlhood. 1. pooping in one's pants because of diarrhea); 2. pubic hair sticking out of the edges of your bathing suit around your thighs (treated as truly horrible; much more than pooping in your pants); 3. decorating yourself naked with food and lying on a table awaiting a boyfriend who never shows; 4. 3-year-old daughter says "sex" showing she HAS been listening into all your conversations.
2. The racism: "Follow that white guy with the baby" shouts one as they look for an apartment in a seedy neighborhood.
1. And the number 1 reason why you shouldn't take your daughter to see The Sex and the City movie?
Please provide it below in the comments section!
It'll delete iq points from you.
The unrealistic potrayl of life, career, relationships, women, men, and how to be an adult.
Stereotyping of everyone. Lack of diversity. Lack of healthy communication between anyone.
And last, but certainly not least, women who are obesessed with finding MR. RIGHT, as long as he's hot- doesn't really matter if he's a good person. HE MUST BE HOT.
Posted by: asrai | June 06, 2008 at 08:48 AM
...because next season rich, promiscuous, self-absorbed, materialistic white ladies will be SO out of style and it'll be all about Hammer pants again.
Posted by: Mommy B | June 06, 2008 at 10:49 AM
Well, I haven't had television for 7 years and can't imagine that I would want me, or any of my three daughters or partner to waste one moment of their lives with anything Hollywood, including whatever the hell Sex In The City is. I can't believe I am even wasting time thinking about it, but there are things to be done in this world folks! Let's get to what matters.
Posted by: Wendy | June 06, 2008 at 11:26 AM
lol... the #1 reason is that it's a really bad movie. poor craft, embarrassing script, and horribly performed!
having recently seen it with a cluster of teens, reason #1 however was the best quality of the film. it was so bad, that it made all of those appalling messages all the more transparent. had it been better quality filmmaking, they could have been swept up in a story and less critical as viewers. instead, they left scratching their heads, disenchanted by the sell-out ending:
"you know it's bad when someone pooping their pants was the best part!"
"yeah, and when that wasn't the GROSSEST part, either..."
Posted by: heatherwb | June 21, 2008 at 12:32 PM
Hi. Just wanted to let you know that if you post a comment that has "adult" information in it, we have to delete it because a lot of kids and teens read our blog. We welcome your comments; just make them appropriate for all ages of readers!!! SHARON AND LYN
Posted by: Sharon Lamb and Lyn Mikel Brown | October 02, 2008 at 09:23 AM
#1 Reason to not take my 9-year-old daughter to this movie:
I actively try to not derail the possibility that she might grow up to be a reasonably healthy human being possessed of basic self-respect.
Posted by: sw | October 17, 2008 at 07:36 AM
That nice girl in NC made a list of movies to rent over summer break for the school newspaper and one movie mentioned is cleaner and more charming than SATC.
Posted by: Jenna | January 24, 2009 at 05:58 AM
Unfortunately, there is a part deux on the horizon . . .
Posted by: Nadirah | January 24, 2009 at 09:10 PM
This movie is one more stone on the pile (or mountain) of media suggestion that a girl's number one purpose of being is to be sexy. That sex, which in reality is only one small aspect to a healthy life, is that which defines us. Not our intelligence, our activities, our relationships (non-sexual) and our life dreams and goals. There is not one item marketed that has not been tainted by sexual inuendo - I saw wall paint sexuallized (paint dripping from the hair of an unclad (sexy) woman. Paint? When a girl's identity is wrapped up in what other's (especially hormone raging boys) see them as the rest of their character is ignored and therefore under developed. Healthy maturation is then thwarted and we are left with broken hurting young women.
Posted by: BerberB | January 26, 2009 at 07:26 AM
Can't wait to see your review of Sex and the City 2 when it comes out. Included a link to your article here.
http://www.squidoo.com/sex-and-the-city-movie-sequel
Posted by: Adrienne Jenkins | February 13, 2009 at 11:49 PM
I found your blog tonight after reading an article on Salon, and following a series of links. As the mother of a 2 1/2 year old daughter, I agree wholeheartedly with SO much of what I've read here, particularly with regard to age compression, and sex segregation in clothing, toys, etc. I am definitely interested in picking up a copy of your book.
It's this entry on the SATC movie however, which has moved me to comment. Admittedly, I should probably recuse myself as an objective opinion. My husband and I (yes. seriously. my husband too.) have been fans of the SATC tv series since back when it first premiered on HBO. We enjoyed the movie for what it was, basically an extra season of the show. It's trashy. It's escapist. But as guilty pleasures go, this is one I think I can live with.
While all of your criticisms here are completely valid, I'm puzzled by the initial supposition that the film's value (or lack of it) is somehow dependant on whether one should bring one's teen / preteen daughter. This was an R rated film. It was widely known to center around the sexual escapades of 4 middle-aged women. Regardless of how much *I* enjoyed the movie, why on earth would I bring my young daughter?
Though outside the scope of this particular blog, what I found more interesting in the case of the SATC movie is the sheer distaste expressed by both men and women, when one hears nowhere near such disgust at more stereotypically male "popcorn movies", with equally questionable ideals.
Posted by: MT | March 05, 2009 at 11:16 PM