Review of Fifty Shades Darker (2017) by Meydianarizki21 — 03 Nov 2020

What a letdown...but funny in the worst way?

I saw it and yeah...I had fun, laughing I guess? For anyone who tells me that its a beautiful, love story...f*ck off. It was the cheesiest, corniest, most awkward-comedic film. But hey, it worked for a great comedy where the jokes on the film. Seriously, the scenes were so bad you couldn't help but laugh. I think FSoG was better in the aspect to take it a bit more "serious" than FSD. This film completely did not give a f*ck, I was disappointed that the plots and other characters (Mrs. Robinson, Jack Hyde, Leila) were weak! It had potential to explore more of these arcs, but it didn't. It was dull and so rushed! Everything was rushed. Even the sex! I'm not expecting full-blown porn but cut the soundtrack songs out, more positions (not just mostly missionary all the time), and please bring in some foreplay. How can a movie about risqué intimacy not show good foreplay? Why does Christian always have an un-emotional face while having sex? No climax either? In the books, wasn't he always grinning (or proudly smiling) for his accomplishment in giving Ana orgasms? For getting off too? None of that...it cuts straight to the next scene. Man...and why was it so Soap-Opera-ish?

I'm not going to lie, I read the trilogy once and I was like, "whatever, this is the junk food to my brain". It wasn't good, but whatever... it served some purpose. Did I think that it was the greatest love story? Nope. Did I think it was a great romantic story? Nope. I was honestly intrigued by the fetish that surrounds BDSM. But it turned out, that even if the sex was hot, it wasn't even portrayed properly. BDSM is a whole other level.

I was walking out and a lot of the viewers said that it did poorly in capturing the book. Like sure, the sex was there, but that connectivity...intimacy... was not. It was like : fight, bang (sex). Argument, bang. Present, bang again. It was repetitive in the sense of just make-up sex all the time. Ana is annoying. She doesn't know what she wants in the film or in life. Its like she can't take Christian's dark ways and not kidding, a few seconds later she's okay with it, without any solidifying reason (unless its going down on her or sex) . I feel like FSoG (2015) attempted some direction towards a woman's viewpoint. Like Ana being "dominant" in the sense of negotiation and choices. In this film, I'm sorry...she comes off like a gold-digger. She comes off like the only reason she's with him is because he's rich. Its like "I can't be with you, like this...(he gives her a gift), oh, I love you!) WTF? She tries so hard to be her own woman, but really ends up being Christian's (and not in the cute way like "Oh, I'm his girl *googly-eyes*) I feel that FSoG (2015) did a better job in where Ana had control and it made sense. Here it's wishy-washy.

Its just a mess, not sexy, everything is rushed that you don't understand the reasoning behind motives. They cut off and rushed great moments and characters that could have given the film more sense, romance and great eroticism. Yes its funny because it tries so hard to take itself serious. But that's about it.