Sarah Jessica Parker Tagged Articles at Cinematical

We already know that Sex and the City 2 is going to do its best to reign in the extreme spending and lavish ways ... and quite possibly get hard-hit by the bad economy. But they didn't have to go back to the '80s in all of its fashion terror!

Now that Sex and the City 2 is a few days into production, eager cameras are shooting up a storm on New York streets. There's Big and Carrie having a laugh and chatting over a car, Sarah Jessica Parker getting pointy, video from the set, one dress that's a little too clingy and see-through, and the little beauty over to the right, courtesy of Entertainment Weekly. You know, SJP was pretty popular in the '80s, having been part of Footloose and Girls Just Want to Have Fun, and she never, ever looked this bad. One can only assume that after the buzz around the first flick's possible trip back to the '80s, they decided to go for it in #2.

Then again, it could be a faux scene to fool us. But I thought the same thing of that god-awful, eye-searing, atrocious, joke of a wedding dress that Carrie donned in the first film, so I bet this is no joke.

Not too much about the plot is being officially revealed, but we should learn more soon. The film will hit screens on May 28, 2010.

The new trailer over at Yahoo for Did You Hear About the Morgans? looks... adorable. There, I said it. Hugh Grant and Sarah Jessica Parker play two high-strung, high-powered NYC couples on the verge of divorce when, oops, they witness a murder and have to enroll in the Federal Witness Protection Program. They're sent to the middle of nowhere -- catch always-fab Mary Steenburgen wielding a shotgun -- and are forced to reexamine their relationship in close quarters. And milk cows.

Yes, hijinks ensue. Yes, it's Hugh Grant being neurotic and English, and SJP is being, well, a slightly more chill version of her Carrie Bradshaw character, and it's the whole "New Yorkers stuck out in the Midwest, oh noes!" thing, but it looks like a cute holiday flick. And I was instantly won over by Steenburgen. Sue me.

Check out the trailer for yourself after the jump (or over on Yahoo) and give me your two cents.

Let me make this clear: when I say that I'm compiling a list of the most contrived rom-com scenarios, I'm not saying that they're automatically the worst -- although a glance at the titles doesn't exactly stray far from that correlation. Tomorrow's The Proposal finds Sandra Bullock forcing Ryan Reynolds into marriage for the sake of holding off immigration authorities and keeping her/their jobs (I guess it's not too soon to remake Green Card and Picture Perfect after all), so we're talking about seven plot points along those lines of high-concept, close-quarters thinking, with some (dis)honorable mentions along the way...

He's been through Four Weddings and a Funeral, traversed the world of Jane Austen, learned what life's like when it's About a Boy, and canoodled the likes of Andie MacDowell, Julia Roberts, Renee Zellweger, and Drew Barrymore. Now Hugh Grant's getting the woman of Manolo Blahniks -- Sarah Jessica Parker.

The Hollywood Reporter posts that Columbia Pictures has pulled the pair together for Marc Lawrence's new, untitled romantic comedy. Refreshingly, there's a slight spin on this puppy to keep it from the usual man, woman, drama, and romantic happy ending rut -- witness protection. It seems the pair will play "an estranged high-powered New York couple who witness a murder and are placed in a witness-protection program in a small Wyoming town." I wonder if they choose to be together so at least they both know someone, or if the powers that be weren't interested in cooking up two top-secret locales. Whatever the case, it could be interesting.

Do you think ol' pros Hugh and Sarah will cook up some good chemistry when production begins next Spring?

Comedies don't have an obligation to be particularly insightful, but you'd think an indie aimed at an adult audience would have something to say about its characters. Smart People stars Dennis Quaid, Sarah Jessica Parker, Ellen Page, and Thomas Haden Church; the cast and the multitude of laughs scored at the expense of easy targets might justify a rental, though I liked it much less after I started thinking about it. I'm in the minority -- James Rocchi expressed all kinds of love in his review. The DVD, out on Tuesday, includes an audio commentary by director Noam Murro and writer Jude Poirier, deleted scenes, bloopers / outtakes, and "the smartest people," which I'm guessing is a "making of" feature. It's also out on Blu-ray.

Also out on Tuesday, How the Garcia Girls Spent Their Summer has been described as "a comedy about three generations of Mexican-American women enjoying their sexuality." I heard all kinds of good things about it when it had some festival play a few seasons ago. America Ferrera, Elizabeth Peña, and Lucy Gallardo star. The DVD looks bare bones, but distributor Maya Entertainment has more about the film on their site.

An appealing romantic comedy set in and around a citrus grove in Sicily, The Orange Thief (pictured) played several film festivals, including Woodstock and AFI Dallas, and is now out on DVD. I'm not going to claim that this low-key charmer is some kind of lost classic, but it's amusing, looks gorgeous, and has the benefit of an incredibly restful, bucolic setting, which make it worth a rental. The DVD from Lightyear appears to feature only the movie.

Over the last few years, Aline Brosh McKenna has become the IT writer girl for rom-coms -- which is a large improvement on her cinematic start, Three to Tango. She's the pen behind the adaptation of The Devil Wears Prada. She just brought us 27 Dresses. She's got a bunch of future projects on her plate. And is now adding another one. The Hollywood Reporter posts that she's going to adapt Karen Quinn's The Ivy Chronicles.

This might sound familiar, because it's the Sarah Jessica Parker-headed project that Eugene blogged about in June. Said to be in the vein on The Devil Wears Prada (which makes Aline's inclusion pretty darned appropriate), the project focuses on a rich New Yorker who loses her job and starts a business helping other rich people get their kids into elite kindergartens. Oh, rich woes.

The material certainly isn't a stretch for the Sex and the City star, or McKenna, so we can imagine how it will turn out as SJP shows us yet another angle of her rich Manhattanite side.

I remember, during an advance screening of The Promotion, I was standing in the movie theater and there were women everywhere. This was about a week or so after Sex and the City came out -- and it was right smack in the middle of the week -- but there were still tons of women, all done up and what not. I joked to my friend that this "tons of nice looking women standing in a movie theater lobby in the middle of a random weekday without any men" was kinda similar to a lunar eclipse, in that it rarely happens. If I were a dating councelor, I'd have recommended my male clients to get the hell over to a Sex and the City screening pronto.

Luckily, single men will most likely have another opportunity to mingle with the SATC crowd over a tub of popcorn and a sexy Dr. Pepper as Entertainment Weekly reports a sequel to Sex and the City is already in development and is apparently being fast-tracked by Warner Brothers (New Line put out the first flick). Michael Lombardo, president of HBO's programming group, told folks during a press tour that "there's a lot of energy behind doing another SATC movie." However, one inside source claims Sarah Jessica Parker and her lady friends are a little hesitant because they don't want to rush into things and disappoint fans. Assuming they add another villain to the mix so that it's not just Spacey's Lex Luthor, I'm sure everything will be fine. Oh wait, wrong franchise.

So who wants another Sex and the City movie?

WHAT?! Well, sort of. Actually, she'll play a rich Manhattanite who loses her high-paying job and posh Upper East Side apartment and decides to start a business helping rich New Yorkers get their kids into elite kindergartens. (Knowing someone who worked as an admissions officer at an elite kindergarten, this is not shocking to me.)

The movie is The Ivy Chronicles, based on a novel by Karen Quinn, and it will have to fight off the immediate impression that it's an epic fantasy film. In fact it's pitched as a comedy in the vein of The Devil Wears Prada and The Nanny Diaries.

Let's talk about Sex, baby ... I got an email from Melissa Silverstein over at Women and Hollywood yesterday, asking a pack of women who work in various aspects of the film industry to share our thoughts on whether a successful box office turn for Sex and the City, which opens this weekend, might herald a change in Hollywood's attitude toward chick-centric movies. Melissa posed the following questions:

• If it's a success do you think that this will change Hollywood minds about whether women can "open" movies?
  
• If it doesn't do the predicted numbers, do you think this will spell more difficulties for women centric films?
  
• Do you think that because this is an "event" that other films about women will be held up to an unrealistic standard?
  
• Do you think there is a double standard for this film?
  
• Are you surprised by the nasty tone that some of the media has taken on this week?

You can read my response, and the thoughts of some other smart women, over on Melissa's site, but in the meantime, I thought this was a great set of questions to pose to Cinematical readers. Whether you love Sex and the City or hate it, what are your thoughts on whether a big box office run for the film might change the way Hollywood thinks about movies for and about women? Discuss away ...