Film: 'Fifty Shades Darker'

Why did I bother? Certainly no improvement at all on the 2015 original which started off the saga of Seattle-based, multi-billionaire Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan), with a penchant for S/M, pursuing unattached and reluctant Anastasia (Dakota Fanning) - or is it she who's after him by playing hard to get? And would it matter? Their several amatory conjugations (which nowadays would hardly qualify even as 'soft' porn, always performed to a tiresome, unimaginative background blast of some bland, unfamiliar song) doesn't resolve matters, at least until the end of the film. However, fret ye not as there's the teasing 'promise' of a yet further sequel.  

I didn't think the original film, though on a similar level as this one, was quite as dire as some critics have suggested - the same way I felt about the E.L.James novel. But this new one, likewise based on James' writings, is hardly an improvement. I'll end up giving this film the same rating as I gave the first.

The moments of drama, such as they are, are when one of Grey's former affairs turns up as a stalker, and also when Anastasia's boss grows jealous of her infatuation. In addition, an early older-partner affair (Kim Basinger) warns Anastasia that Grey will tire of her and cast her aside - just as she warned in the original. The screen only comes alive when she and Marcia Gay Harden (as Christian's mother) appear, 

James Foley does the directing honours here, taking over from Sam Taylor-Wood, though their styles are much of a muchness.

I couldn''t understand at all what Anastasia saw in this Christian character - or could it have something to do with his being as rich as Trump? In the same way I didn't appreciate why he wouldn't give up the hopeless pursuit of the reluctant Anastasia when the entire world was his for the choosing. But what do I know of the vagaries of love, never having experienced it?............3.