Wednesday, May 28, 2008 | 1:57 p.m.
The "Sex and the City" movie is the "Jaws," the "Star Wars," the "Lord of the Rings" of chick flicks. What's the distaff form of "blockbuster"? Bombshell, maybe?
Tuesday night's Las Vegas preview of the long-awaited big-screen reunion of Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha (and Big, Steve, Harry, Smith, Stanford and Anthony) felt like what an olde-time Hollywood Movie Premiere must have been like. By 6 p.m. hundreds were waiting in a long line outside the Regal Village Square 18. And this wasn't your everyday flip-flops and sweatsuits-wearing we-won-free-tickets-so-why not? screening crowd. These people (at least 98 percent women and their best gays. And maybe a husband or two), these people were excited. They came in packs, gangs, flocks. And they dressed up to go to a movie. And for each other. Some serious outfits -- summer dresses, sequins and most of all, shoes -- were being rocked at this semi-suburban multiplex before sundown.
No one really explained to the audience that the "Countdown to the Red Carpet" on the movie screen meant that we were going to see a delayed feed of the New York City premiere event at Radio City Music Hall, which had taken place just a few hours before. The crowd cheered as stars Sarah Jessica Parker and Kim Cattrall made their way through clots of tense-looking PR women. But the most audience love, at least in our packed-to-the-walls theater, seemed to go to Chris Noth, Kristin Davis and David Eigenberg.
Hosted by the effusive (bordering on hysterical) Entertainment Tonight fashion maven Steven Cojocaru, the celebrity arrivals took up more than 30 minutes, and seemed mostly to prove how boring red carpet events really are, even (perhaps especially) to the stars. SJP looked every inch a movie goddess in a silvery Nina Ricci gown that looked like the Chrysler Building seen through a summer shower.
This movie is actually critic-proof," commented actor Willie Garson, who plays Stanford, Carrie's gay besty. And it seems he'll be proven right about that. (A continuation of the hit HBO series, "Sex and the City" opens nationwide this Friday; opening weekend is already being referred to as "the Superbowl for girls.") "You are gonna tinkle in your Cosabella thong!" promised Cojo. And at last, after an hours-long (and years-long) wait, it was time for the movie.
It was all up there onscreen: beloved characters, wedding gown montages, soapy plot twists, swoony and soft-core eye-candy, front-row Fashion Week footage, shoe fetishism, handbag fetishism, closet fetishism, fetishism fetishism... Wisecracks were cracked, cliffs were hung, fantasies were fulfilled, tears were jerked. The crowd gasped and applauded in unison at plot revelations and outfit changes alike.
Yeah, it's narcissistic and nonsensical, infuriatingly so at times. And at two hours and 15 minutes, it's too long. But I'll bet everyone there tonight (maybe not the husbands) would have happily sat through another two hours or more, just to have a little more time with their big screen BFFs. (And more costume montages!) The line for the sequel starts here.
UPDATE: After you see the movie, you may be interested in checking out a few of these "plot points" online:
Yes, there is such a thing as Bag, Borrow and Steal, an online site where you can rent ultra-expensive designer handbags and jewelry -- "Netflix for purses," as Jennifer Hudson's character puts it. A Louis Vuitton bag, for instance, rents for $145 a week or $425 a month.
That Eiffel Tower purse Carrie is swinging is available for a cool $3,000 (with the 6,300 Swarovski crystals; without, it's just $450.
Carrie has upgraded to a MacBook Pro; you can snoop around her computer desktop here.
The library book Carrie is reading in bed, "Love Letters of Great Men and Women," is available at Amazon.com.
And there's a word for serving sushi on a woman's naked body: nyotaimori.
Evite, the online party invitation service, says it has helped plan more than 14,000 SATC get-togethers, most of them for 20 people or more.
The last word goes, as it should, to Gawker, the hilariously mean New York blog:
"You might be indifferent to the 'Sex And The City' movie, but across the country there are squads of women who care way, way too much about the film and who have already begun planning drunken, cackling rampages on opening night. Some women have commandeered jets to meet friends for the premiere; some of those will descend on New York. Once assembled, the teams will eat overpriced Asian fusion, yell at movie screens, terrorize nightclubs and, of course, consume near-lethal doses of cosmopolitans...
On the bright side, this will be a huge, huge money night for cat-sitters."
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