Here it is---the first film I literally needed to take a shower directly after seeing. Fifty Shades Of Grey also gets the highest of dishonors---being the most genuinely unpleasant film I have ever sat through in my decade and a half of watching movies obsessively. This is a disgusting, painful, grotesque, labored, tedious, cruel "film" that has not an ounce of humanity to it. How does something like this get green lit when there are genuinely talented filmmakers with good films getting denied into independent film festivals? I have a policy to always (and I mean always) stick it out to the bitter end when it comes to film. I regret having that policy sitting through such an extravagantly gross watch. I know making a film is a long and difficult (this film doesn't even deserve a pun like "long and hard') process but why not give some damn effort in that case? I understand everyone involved in the making of this film was doing their jobs and in theory I shouldn't attack them but everyone who even visited the set of this crap should be ashamed of themselves.
I usually write a plot synopsis but taking the time to try and find a story here would be giving this garbage much more credit than it deserves. The closest thing to a plot that I can come up with is that Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson play two people with absolutely no chemistry (in fact, they have so little chemistry that on a scale of 1 to 10, their chemistry ranks at a -10,000) who have sex a couple of times and babel in between those times.
The big selling point of this film is the sex. To that I say "phony!!!!!" The sex is non-existent for most of the film and when it does happen, Anastasia (Johnson) is so clearly not into it that the film ends up feeling like a found footage rape.
That brings me to my other big problem---the misogyny. For a film directed and written by women (Sam Taylor Johnson and Kelly Marcel, from EL James's novel, respectively,) this is an incredibly misogynistic film. I would go so far as to say this is the most hateful film I have ever seen when it comes to opinions toward women. The film's message reads "if you're an adult female, the only way to be happy is to be a sex slave." What a positive message for females to spread to other females! This is especially depressing since screenwriter Marcel co-wrote 2013's wonderful Saving Mr. Banks, which had an incredibly strong female character in Emma Thompson. Oh how she (Marcel) has fallen.
I'm not going to waste anymore time writing about this film. All you need to know is Dornan and Johnson are awful, the film is abysmal and the message is grossly offensive, even from a male perspective. I have never read James's novels but if they're even 1% as mind numbing as the piece of trash that has come from the first one, I don't know how they could have been the phenomenon they were. I beg of anyone anywhere reading this review--spend your two plus hours doing something more productive, like getting dental surgery. Also, if you're planning on spending money on this film---throw your cash down the sewer instead. At least then a rat might get some nutrition out of it and thus it would have been way more justifiably spent.
(0 out of 5 Stars, The film is rated R for strong sexual content including dialogue, some unusual behavior and graphic nudity, and for language)
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