THIS STORY HAS BEEN FORMATTED FOR EASY PRINTING

On Demand picks

December 22, 2009

E-mail this article

Invalid E-mail address
Invalid E-mail address

Sending your article

Your article has been sent.

  • E-mail|
  • Print|
  • Reprints|
  • |
Text size – +

SEX AND THE CITY
(HBO on Comcast) The former HBO series spawned a movie, all two hours and 15 minutes of it. The film version, which was written and directed by Michael Patrick King, is just like a season of the show -- a funny, sappy, clumsy, crude, rambunctious, argumentative, gleefully vulgar attempt to balance the fantasy of romance with the reality that the prescribed fantasy is impossible. Sarah Jessica Parker, Cynthia Nixon, Kristin Davis, and Kim Cattrall reprise their roles, and it’s a pleasure to see them together again. (R; runs through Dec. 28) WESLEY MORRIS

SLEEPING WITH THE ENEMY
(HBO on Comcast) Julia Roberts musters the necessary intensity for her role as a battered wife trying to escape her dangerous husband. But the script fails her, reducing what should be a heartfelt experience to hollow formula. Patrick Bergin’s spousal heavy is reduced to a cardboard cutout, a yuppie Hitler, and Joseph Ruben’s direction can’t get around the shortfall. (R; runs through Dec. 28)

SWEET NOVEMBER
(HBO on Comcast) This remake of the 1968 Sandy Dennis-Anthony Newley romance improves upon it slightly thanks to the increased scope and heft with which Charlize Theron infuses a San Francisco eccentric who rides the plot to tear-jerker territory just when she was turning Keanu Reeves’s ad agency workaholic into an acceptable lover. (PG-13; runs through Dec. 28)

© Copyright 2009 Globe Newspaper Company.

Latest Entertainment Twitters

Get breaking entertainment news, gossip, and the latest from Boston Globe critics and Boston.com A&E staff.
Follow us on Twitter