Yep, I saw it. I work for the movie com­pany that pro­duced it, so I got to go for free. The stan­dard line with Michael Patrick King’s now decade-old Sex and the City fran­chise is that it has always appealed mostly to gay men and the women that love them. Even though this Dork Reporter is more or less a white­bread straight dude (while I like naked lady bot­toms and affirm Sean Con­nery is the best James Bond, auto­mo­biles and pro­fes­sional sports don’t move me), I don’t mean that as a dis­claimer. While I’d never seen more than por­tions of the orig­i­nal tele­vi­sion show, and I’d not vol­un­tar­ily pay see the movie in the the­ater or rent the DVD, I’m not ashamed to say I’ve seen it.

After shop­ping, let’s go shopping

I had recently seen an advance screen­ing of a yet-to-be released film (that will have to remain name­less here) that had more than a lit­tle in com­mon with the plot and char­ac­ters of Sex and the City. Let me just say that in com­par­i­son, Sex and the City is a mas­ter­piece, and at least, watch­able by straight men. The male char­ac­ters in the film are endowed with more char­ac­ter­i­za­tion and com­plex­ity than I would have expected. When Mr. Big (Chris Noth) does some­thing “bad,” it’s because he’s con­fused and con­flicted, not because he’s a douchebag (which is the expla­na­tion of any and all bad behav­ior by male char­ac­ters in the afore­men­tioned movie-that-cannot-be-named-for-professional-reasons).

Hey there, Mr. Big Stuff

To get into the nitty gritty of the plot, there was one aspect that I just couldn’t wrap my head around: Miranda (Cyn­thia Nixon) makes an under­stand­ably bit­ter com­ment about mar­riage in gen­eral to Mr. Big that becomes one of many influ­ences upon his spon­ta­neous deci­sion to leave Car­rie (Sarah Jes­sica Parker) at the altar. Miranda neglects to tell Car­rie about her com­ment, and the event and its cover-up is weighted by the film as A) the worst thing one friend can do to another and B) the sin­gle rea­son why Mr. Big stood Car­rie up. When Miranda even­tu­ally comes clean, Car­rie reacts as if she sees Mr. Big and his actions in a wholly new light, and the rec­on­cil­i­a­tion begins. I just don’t get it; it seems to me, based on the fic­tional char­ac­ters’ actions and moti­va­tions in the world of the film, that Miranda’s minor indis­cre­tion is exactly that, and the true prob­lem is in fact Mr. Big’s ambiva­lence about Carrie’s desire for a dis­gust­ingly overblown princess wed­ding. But I sup­pose the answer to my con­fu­sion may sim­ply be that I don’t get it because I’m a dude.

And finally, a Dork Report Pub­lic Ser­vice Announce­ment for any other blog­gers search­ing the inter­webs for movie stills with which to illus­trate their reviews of Sex and the City: depend­ing on your incli­na­tions, exer­cise cau­tion when Googling “Mr. Big.”

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Offi­cial movie site: www.sexandthecitymovie.com

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