“Freedom is slavery.” — George Orwell, 1984.
Biases up front: No subject bores me more than that of human sexuality; which I see as just another form of navel-gazing invented by the narcissistic plague of locusts we call Baby Boomers. Also, although she is all-kinds of adorable, Dakota Johnson, star of “Fifty Shades Darker,” does nothing for me. Unfortunately, she has the body of a 14 year-old boy. I want to see a woman naked, not Justin Bieber.
One can therefore argue that this makes it impossible for me to give “Darker” a fair shot. The truth, though, is that my inability to relate to the subject-matter, or to be distracted by the bewbs, makes it possible for me to see The Matrix that lies behind “Fifty Shades Darker”… and it is truly sinister. Let me first lay out where I have no biases…
What consenting adults do in the privacy of their own home makes me no nevermind. We’re lucky to live in a country where people can get their freak on. With those freedoms comes plenty of downside, no question. The porn industry, for instance, grinds up the women who star in it and warps the sexuality of too many of the young men who are its primary customers. Nevertheless, the horrors of that freedom are preferable to the horrors used to repress that freedom.
So if grown-ups want to get whipped and handcuffed, whatever. My indifference to what we now call alternate lifestyles— you’d be awed by how little I care. Also, as long as we’re talking about adults expressing free will, film all the filth you want. Again, I just don’t care.
What I do care about, though, what does raise my hackles, is dishonesty. When a major film studio, like Universal, spends $100 million to produce and promote a shiny piece of propaganda that lies to young women, that tells the impressionable that it is an act of YouGoGirl empowerment to allow a man to manipulate you, to psychologically cage you, to sexually degrade you… Man alive.
Like its predecessor, “Fifty Shades of Grey” (2015), “Fifty Shades Darker” is the biggest gift anyone could give to Men Who Treat Women Like Meat. What we have here is a big league franchise film that serves as a study guide in how to manipulate women into agreeing to be used. Worse, it brainwashes women into believing that being degraded and controlled is a form of healthy feminism.
When we last saw Anastasia (Johnson), she was walking out on her sadist boyfriend, billionaire playboy Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan). In his Red Room of Pain, a place stocked with whips, oils, chains, and a whole bunch of creepy S&M gear I’ve never even heard of (and I’ve seen “Pulp Fiction”), Grey lost sexual control of himself and whipped Ana. Because of a troubled childhood, our wounded, brooding hunky-boy hero can only get off by inflicting pain.
The break-up does not last long. Ana misses her Perverted Prince Charming, and before you know it he is once again whisking her off, Pretty Woman-style, into the enchanted wonderland that is his life: yachts, masked balls, penthouse apartments, limos, stylists, diamonds, fancy restaurants, Beautiful People and designer gowns.
Along the way, we are treated to no fewer than seven explicit sex scenes, where we get to watch Anastasia spanked, tied up, put in leg irons, introduced to nipple clamps, and let’s just say — I’ll put this as delicately as possible — Mr. Grey is not big on looking into Ana’s eyes during the act of love.
And all along the way the movie lies to us, tells us Anastasia is in charge, even as she’s flipped over like a naked pancake, even as she’s emotionally and financially manipulated into Grey’s gilded cage.
Ana defiantly tears up a $24,000 check. She doesn’t want his money! He immediately gets on the phone and wires it into her account. She’s horrified he knows her bank account number. But she’s really not — it’s actually kind of romantic in a handsome-stalker kind of way. Later on, She! Shows! Him! by giving away the money at a fancy charity auction, an act that makes our shy heroine the center of attention. Oh, look at her blossom!
Grey also keeps a thick file on Ana, complete with photos of her walking down the street. Be still my heart.
Ana wants to make it on her own in her chosen career as a book editor. Grey immediately buys the company she works for and naturally, as a strong, independent woman, she’s furious …. until he “saves her” from her boss, a sexual harasser. Ana is then promoted into her dream job, which Grey had nothing to do with. Riiiight.
Ana meets Leila, a young woman emotionally and psychologically shattered by her sexually-submissive relationship with Grey. Looking like she just escaped from a concentration camp, Leila breaks into Ana’s apartment wielding a revolver. But Grey swoops in to save the day by ordering Leila to get down on her knees, which she immediately does. This reality so troubles Ana, she needs a whole three-hour walk in the rain before she’ll have sex with him again.
This movie is so amoral that Leila is not used as a tragic, cautionary tale, but rather as a cheap device, a dramatic roadblock to Ana and Grey’s true and eternal love.
Grey is constantly barking orders at Ana, but we’re told she’s empowered because at first she resists … just before doing exactly what he says — you know, because she made him ask again in a nice way. It is the same with the sex. Because Ana chooses to be treated like meat, we’re told she’s the one in charge.
Outside of this insidious message, outside of the fact that I am not a Belieber, the movie just sucks. The dialogue is horrible. The story is butt-numbingly dull. The plot-twists are ludicrous. (Where the hell did that helicopter crash come from?) For the price of a single ticket, you can subscribe to a month’s worth of Cinemax. Why would anyone pay to sit through 118-minutes of soft-core porn wrapped in a script that makes your standard Lifetime movie look like “Casablanca?”
Anyway…
Grey just wants to make Ana’s dreams come true. Swoon!
Ana just wants to save Grey from himself. Sigh!
Now bend over so I can insert this string of ball-bearings into your flower pot.
Oh, yeah — you’ve come a long way, baby.
Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC. Follow his Facebook Page here.
