Written by: Niall Leonard, based upon the book by E.L. James
Starring: Dakota Johnson, Jamie Dornan, Eric Johnson
Alright, I watched it, now I'm going to go burn to death in a fire fueled only by my pure self-hatred created by having to sit through it. As you may have guessed, I wasn't a fan of the film.
There are some things that Darker did better than Grey, a lot of things it did worse, and a few things were about the same. This film is high-priced trashy smut, soft-core porn with a $55 million price tag; it pretends to be more than it is by having a high production value, but this film offers nothing of value if you take it in any way seriously, so if you have to endure it, try not to take it as such.
*Warning: Spoilers Ahead (not that it really matters with this movie)*
Oh boy, let's just start from the beginning with this one. After ten minutes of moping because they broke up at the end of the first one, Anastasia and Christian are back together again, and ten minutes later they're screwing again. I suppose this is a step up for some from the first film, which took about twice as long to get to any action. Christian has somehow managed to stop doing all of the things that Ana didn't like after their week(?) long break up, so despite the fact that he still stalks her and tries to control her actions, their relationship is completely stable for the rest of the movie because he can now get it up for vanilla sex. Anastasia even comments on Christian's stalker-ish behaviour multiple times as being not okay, but he ignores it and she seems to forget about it within five minutes. That's all this film really is: a conflict arises for Ana, Christian solves it, they bang, repeat ad nauseam. Sometimes the conflict later results in Ana lucking in to a promotion, sometimes the conflict is as simple as Christian opening up to her a little, but whatever happens, the problem is solved within five minutes so that the two can screw for the next five. It's quite literally soft-core porn mixed with soap opera at this point (though admittedly in its own way that's a lot better than the "abusive relationship masquerading as BDSM" from Grey). This is only made worse by how ridiculous the film gets as it blunders on. The peak of this film's stupidity involves a helicopter crash. Christian flies a helicopter, the helicopter crashes, Ana and Christian's family rush to Christian's apartment while the police search, the news reports that Christian has just been found and is now on his way home and Christian immediately steps in to the scene. He's a little dirty, but no worse for wear. This isn't the first time Christian pulls off an impossible feat, and it's led me to believe that Christian Grey is secretly a Terminator.
That description summarises Dornan's performance as Christian. He's stiff and expressionless; at one point he states "I don't do calm" which made me burst out laughing because he's showed almost zero emotion across both of these movies. Even in scenes with more tender or dramatic moments he's still flat as a board with an unwavering voice, much like a Terminator. Honestly, if the third movie reveals that Christian is a robot from the future, who only schemed to get close to Ana so that he could stop her from mothering the saviour of mankind, then I would be unsurprised and forgive these movies for all of their crap, especially Dornan's 'acting'. I have sympathy for the guy in real life, since he didn't want to do the sex scenes, but that doesn't justify his performance when a lot of people have told me that he has done much better (eg. The Fall).
Dakota Johnson doesn't fare much better as Anastasia. She's weak, both as an actress and as a character, never really doing anything of her own volition, with any attempt to do so only really happening because Christian can make it happen. She donates $24,000 to a charity because she doesn't want Christian's money, but she was able to do so only because he gave her the money in the first place. She lucks in to a big promotion after her boss gets fired for forcefully attempting to seduce her, but that only happens because Christian is the one who fired her boss. It doesn't paint women in a good light, but I'd hope that Anastasia isn't used as a model character for women to look up to, since she's either timid or bold with no in-between, with little reason for why other than the demanding of the plot, and she looks past Christian's awful behaviour because he tells her the truth sometimes and happens to be a good lay.
Speaking of the sex, this film is - there's no other word for it - really boring about it. For a series that was touted for its use of BDSM, the film is about 90% basic, with the use of handcuffs, etc, being done away with in the first 30 seconds of any given scene. I doubt it would have saved the movie, but the vanilla way they've done it here is indicative of this movie's transition to a more 'soap opera' style. Dakota Johnson's breasts and Jamie Dornan's abs may be titillating the first time, but they're shown so often that it's desensitising. It doesn't help that these two have basically no chemistry on-screen; Dornan is stiff (pun intended) throughout every proceeding, again never really changing his expression and screwing like he's trying to prevent John Connor from destroying Skynet, while Johnson does little but gasp and moan a few times. It's a real mess, with poor plot and poor sex going back-to-back while the constant reminder that this relationship is extremely unhealthy plagued the back of my mind. It doesn't help that after they get engaged it's revealed that this entire film's plot takes place over two weeks; real romance for the ages right there.
The Verdict: What a shock, it's worse than schlock. Anyone who's on the fence about seeing it, don't, as Darker essentially destroys what little value the first film had, offering total character 180s and a plot with more holes than E.L. James' mind, as well as stiff acting so devoid of chemistry that the only emotion I felt during the sex scenes was boredom. If you refuse to take it seriously in any way, you may be able to convince yourself that this is some sort of inept comedy in a similar vein to The Room (2003). For the people reading this who wanted me to see this film just so I'd have to review it, I hope this is what you wanted to read.
Rating: 3/10
Published February 23rd, 2017
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