In the sweeping establishing shots over the ostensible settings of rom-coms we come to understand at last the power in the metaphor of the heart as depopulated city. The heart, as it breaks, is perfected. We know this. That is why it is called Sex and the City, not Sex in the City. Is Sarah Jessica Parker supposed to be the nice one, on set? So why’s it so easy to imagine her slapping the shit out of some clumsy make-up guy, or calling Cattrall a washed-up talentless cunt?
Overhearing plays a role in this film, in which a super-successful realtor and her husband (a lawyer, Hugh Grant) are forced by events to travel across both the United States and, simultaneously, mysteriously, across its map. Only one woman and I took in this poorly-heated matinee. I let her do the laughing, accepting that, if I wasn’t going to laugh aloud much, I must be careful above all not to laugh once. To laugh only once would have insulted her terribly, which would have spoiled the gratitude we owed one another for not having to be alone—exactly the crux of this glittering tale.
I like those addenda to myths, as when the barber, prohibited on pain of death from gossiping about King Midas’s donkey ears, goes out and digs a hole in which to whisper the hot item, only to be exposed when the story is picked up and reported by the shushing reeds. Spoiler alert: in the final five minutes, the titular couple name the baby they adopt from China after the site of their near-assassination and ultimate reconciliation (a small Wyoming town). But who will sing this enigmatic gesture? The usherette informs me that this film is on the chopping block: Thursday will be the last day it plays.
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