ants! — everyone’s favourite jean-related alliance returns in Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2
Because teenage girls aren’t allowed to drink cosmopolitans, there’s The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. These four girls haul around just as much baggage as the Sex and the City team, only the sisterhood doesn’t carry half of it under its eyes.
So surprisingly fresh was the 2005 film, it’s easy to understand the trepidation of serving up an additional chapter. As the girls get older, their cutesy charm falls back a step. Then there’s returning screenwriter Elizabeth Chandler trying to cram not one but three of Anne Brashares’s Sisterhood novels into one script. Here you thought curvy old Ugly Betty putting on the titular slacks would be the only squeezing going on.
Somehow, though, it all works. Granted, not nearly as well as it did in the first installment, which told the story of four gal pals separated for the summer, sharing an unbreakable bond via a pair of magical jeans. In the sequel, the characters spend even more time apart — so, for the most part, their winning chemistry is useless. Thankfully, all are fair enough talents to keep their own personal adventures interesting enough until the sisterhood hooks up for a big finale in Greece. No, they don’t break into ABBA melodies.
The plot has college distancing the one-time high school BFFs, though other factors play in, too. Carmen (Ferrera) becomes a drama queen and chases romance at a Vermont theatre festival. Lena (Bledel) is caught in a messy love triangle at a design school in Rhode Island. Tibby (Tamblyn) might have a bun in the oven, and Bridget (Lively) uncovers repressed pain over her mother’s suicide during an archaeological dig in Turkey.
Some of the situations are weighty, some are fluff, but the spunky cast carries the tale graciously. Director Sanaa Hamri uses a chunk of emotional manipulation to push the right buttons, a fair move given the target audience who will gush girly tears with each mushy maneuver. It’s a little overstuffed (remember, it’s based on three books), but a decent flick nonetheless. Keep in mind, though, like before, these jeans best fit the ladies.
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