The big screen look into the troubled life of 70’s porn superstar Linda Lovelace now has a number of venerable character actors onboard.

Robert Patrick, Hank Azaria, Bobby Cannavale and Chris Noth have joined the production, which stars Amanda Seyfried in the lead role and Peter Sarsgaard as her violent, manipulative husband. Like Walk the Line, Patrick is performing daddy duties again and has been cast as Lovelace’s estranged father, while ‘Simpsons’ voice veteran Azaria will play the director of the porn flick in which she made her name, Deep Throat.

Howl co-directors Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman have assembled an interesting cast so far. Recent names to sign up were Wes Bentley, Sharon Stone and the up-and –coming Juno Temple.

News via Screen International

This is a Blu-ray review of Sex And the City 2 so I do not need to go over aspects of this film already discussed on this site, Em’s caustic yet considered review is available here and says everything which needs to be said about this howler.

For this I am grateful, because having to watch Sarah Jessica Parker, Kristin Davis, Cynthia Nixon and Kim Cattrall go through the motions of a making a film so woefully poor, so devoid of plot and so utterly charmless made me want to cry.

So unanimously was this film condemned that it is impossible to be anything other than one among many chiding all involved for making a film so vacuous and gaudy that I actually felt the gravitational pull towards the TV as the film began to suck so much.

There’s confusion about the message of liberation, both sexual and religious, which steps casually into outright offense and while some moments point to plot strands the TV series would have dealt with in a witty and nicely licentious manner, there’s little here beyond humour so unsophisticated it borders on the physically painful.

Instead we have four dead eyed characters whipping furiously around New York and Abu Dhabi like they’ve been snorting full length mirrors coated in ground up diamonds and cocaine, cracking insultingly obvious puns and dragging knuckles and shopping bags from plot point to plot point with a crazed set of smiles and eyes full of paychecks.

Sex and the City lost a lot when it upgraded to the big screen, now the sequel proves that it has become a parody of itself, with self indulgent karaoke scenes, half baked home truths lodged hamfistedly into a vast shopping advert, not to mention an appearance by Alice Eve whose character is outrageously derogatory to all human kind and serves no purpose other than to make the rest of the film a meditation on the human condition worthy of Satre in comparison.

There’s nothing behind this film other than vanity and the vast stampede of a herd of cash cows laughing all the way to the bank, and the twist and flux of its sexual politics belittle anything the series ever did and this is a diamond ring crowded middle finger in the face of economic hardship. It is not escapism. It is not tongue in cheek, and it is not harmless fun.

Buy this Blu-ray if you need to complete your Sex in the City collection, or if you have a fetish for spotting fashion details, are a die hard fan of Liza Minelli, or have masochistic tendencies.  All these are all valid reasons.

On the Blu you will get these Special Features, for the time in your life when you want to give your soul an extra vicious kicking.

Commentary with Director Michael Patrick King
So Much Can Happen in Two Years – A Conversation with Sarah Jessica Parker and Michael Patrick King
Styling Sex and the City 2
Very Carrie: A Positiviely Fabulous Look at the Life of Carrie Bradshaw
Marry Me Liza!
Revisiting the 80′s
The Men of Sex and the City
The Men of Sex and the City: Pop Quiz
Sex and the City 2 Soundtrack: Behind the Scenes with Alicia Keys

The Blu-ray and DVD is out today!

Today is a good day.

After performing admirably at the box office, a second sequel to Sex and the City seemed almost inevitable. Almost. According to star Kristen Davis, who was asked by E! Online whether or not a third big screen outing was in the works, “I don’t think so, not that I know of.”

Sounding almost regretful (“I wish it was so that we were continuing but I don’t know.”), Davis is not exactly channeling the general consensus. Blaming the media for hyping it up and then knocking it down, Davis apparently remains ignorant to the indifference that greeted Sex and the City 2 from both fans and sceptics alike.

Deemed to have jumped the cocktail, Sex and the City 2 has since been criticised on gender and racial grounds, as well as for being a bit rubbish.

And with a collective shrug, the world is free of Carrie Bradshaw.

Reported by Steven Neish

You’ll know the name James Kleinmann from all the awesome audio interviews that he gives us. James has now branched out into the video market and has just sent me interviews with all the cast and director of Sex and the City 2.

James was lucky enough to fly out to New York to meet Cynthia Nixon, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis, Sarah Jessica Parker, Chris Noth and director, Michael Patrick King who were all there to chat nothing but Sex and the City 2.

I’ve embedded all the interviews below for your viewing pleasure. You can also see photos and footage from the UK premiere last night here and read Em’s review of the movie here.

Director: Michael Patrick King

Chris Noth (Mr. Big)

Cynthia Nixon (Miranda Hobbes)

Kim Cattrall (Samantha Jones)

Kristin Davis (Charlotte York)

Sarah Jessica Parker (Carrie Bradshaw)

Once upon a time in New York City there lived four beautiful friends who shared the naked truth about their lives and loves with one another and opened their hearts to women all over the world.  Once upon a time in deepest, darkest Essex I fell utterly and irrevocably in love with them all…

But lord how they’ve tried my patience tonight!

For the six seasons Sex and the City ran it was my idea of televisual perfection.  Sure it was flawed, and yes some of the scenarios the quartet faced were as improbable as the clothes they wore, but when it was good it was really, really, good.  I saw the first film on the day it opened and it too was flawed yet I kept the faith.  I wanted to believe Sex and the City 2 could bring the fabulous back to the franchise.  It is with great sadness that I must report it did not.

The second Sex and the City film poses the question: what happens after you say “I do”?  Carrie and Big are settling into married life on Fifth, and if their apartment isn’t the heaven of the first film, it is at least in the celestial ballpark.  Charlotte is the proud Mother of two little girls, Miranda as successful and high-achieving as ever and Samantha…

Well Samantha still has the comedy dog.

Everyone is sitting pretty in New York City and the movie opens with the glitzy wedding of two of our favourite co-stars.  The ladies have Birkins, babies and Botox, what more could one ask from life?

A great deal apparently.  None are content.  Carrie is finding that married life lacks “sparkle” while Samantha’s 52 years are playing on her mind and her libido.  Miranda feels unappreciated at work and Charlotte has troubles of the sexy Nanny kind.  If this were 1998 we’d have the ingredients for an entire box set of compulsory viewing.  Unfortunately here in 2010 we have to endure 146 minutes of bad puns and lazy plot devices.  I had gathered from the trailer that the movie wandered to foreign shores but I didn’t realise quite how meandering a journey it would take.

I really hate to SATC bash but I don’t know what else to do.  It felt as though Michael Patrick King had never written for these characters before.  The best way I can describe this film is as a rom com based upon characters from the TV show Sex and the City.  As though the franchise was opened up for new writers to rework and reinterpret as they saw fit.  The very worst infringement of all was taking the women out of New York City – taking the City out of Sex and the City!  Without a city it lost its soul and became small minded and small town.  Given the depressing, uniformly smooth, foreheads of our leads, I suspect that town was Stepford.

I’m rather cross with myself tonight because I should have known better, I’d heard rumblings of the badness I simply chose to ignore them.  There were moments of connection with the spirit of SATC past – moments when the heartfelt friendship between the women shone through.  When tempers flare between Carrie and Charlotte as Carrie struts away for a reunion with her dating history, you can feel the potential for a better film brush across the screen.  And then it is gone.

If this were a film of another name it would perhaps be judged less harshly.  The racial stereotyping is unforgivably tacky and the four leads poorly drawn but Sex and the City 2 has some redeeming features.  The costumes, as ever, are gloriously far-fetched and at least two of the cameos drew gasps of delight from the rapt audience.  It’s a big, camp, ridiculous mess but somehow it is also rather endearing.  There is a vulnerability to each of these women that permeates the homogenised soap opera issues they have been given to play out and for this reason I cannot think too unkindly of it.

I believe that Sex and the City will survive this film, fans will accept its flaws and forgive its trespasses.  After all, that’s what you do when you’re in love…

Sex and the City 2 opens across the UK today

I’m not very much looking forward to the new Sex and the City Movie but I think this poster is great.

Here’s some awesome marketing from the guys in charge of the Sex and the City 2 campaign. As most of the planet knows, the Football World Cup begins on June 11th and football fever is really hitting the movie industry. If you’ve not seen it yet, click here right now and check out the new Nike advert directed by Alejandro Gonzalez which is possibly one of the best adverts (commercials) I’ve ever seen.

Anyway, back to Sex and the City. In this new poster we get to see a huge high-heel crushing a football to keep with the World Cup theme. Sex and the City 2 stars Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis, Cynthia Nixon, Chris Noth, David Eigenberg, Evan Handler, Jason Lewis, Mario Cantone and Willie Garson.

Thanks to JoBlo.com for sharing this one with us.

I can’t claim to know too much about Sex and the City 2, and let’s face it, I don’t really want to. That said, one thing I do know about the movie is that it has a massive following and therefore I have taken it upon myself to bring you this new batch of images released by Warner Bros. from the movie which is released 28th May which is now only a couple of weeks away! Yay!

Sex and the City 2 sees all the usuals return including Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis, Cynthia Nixon, Chris Noth, David Eigenberg and Evan Handler. It’s brought to us by director, Michael Patrick King.

Check out the new images below and try to contain your excitement!

Warner Bros. have released the first official photos for the sequel to their 2008 feature length version of Sex and the City via Brazilian website Omelete. They show Sarah Jessica-Parker (Carrie) and Chris Noth (Mr. Big) walking and getting into a car!

The images don’t really tell us anything about plot nor do they look any different to other images that we’ve seen for the movie or TV series in the past but I know a lot of people out there (mostly women?) are eager for the 2nd feature length installment so I thought I’d post them up! Click them below to enlarge.

Sex and the City 2 is released 28th May 2010.