Fifty Shades Darker

Ok, my fiance loves these films (but she's worse than me when it comes to sex in movies, and I'll sit through some serious crap for it) so we went to go see it on Valentines Day. And I am going to point out the problem, and I will do it by quoting the synopsis: "Anastasia must confront the anger and envy of the women who came before her." Yeah, that takes all of about 5 minutes of time in the film. It's the plot of the movie...and it takes about 5 minutes total. The problem is solved really quickly, in the middle of the film, and never comes up again. It's like an after thought....but it's the plot. I've seen movies based on T and A in the past that have actually more plot focus than this. But let's be honest, you are only watching it for the BDSM (which it is also light on) so I can't even give it 10 stars for that, and I am an easy grader when it comes to most movie reviews.

<em>'Fifty Shades Darker'</em> is a surprise small improvement on its predecessor, though admittedly not anything worthy of describing as good. It felt like this one had a touch more meat on the bones, it's slightly more digestible anyway; if ignoring events last time out. The film does take the cheap way out mind you, focusing on two 'worse' characters which allows you to look past the iffy questions regarding the leading pair's relationship. I didn't cringe as much for this 2017 flick, which is a decent sign that I had a marginal better time. Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan remain a fine pair as actors, I don't have anything against those two to be honest. The side of the story involving Bella Heathcote's character did honestly interest me a little bit early on, of course it doesn't end up delivering but still. Now to see if <em>'Fifty Shades Freed'</em> continued the upward trajectory <i>(x = doubt)</i>.