Let me be right up front and say that I have never saw the first film in the series. I never had the interest when it was in theaters back in 2005, and can you blame me? I am clearly not the target audience. So, I guess you are wondering why I chose to subject myself to the sequel, especially without the reference point of the first film? Frankly, I don't have an answer, at least not a good one. The fact remains that I chose to put myself in that theater, I chose to sit through a movie that did not have me in mind, and I chose to watch a movie that I was relatively sure I wouldn't care for. I wanted to like it, but so-called "chick flicks" have done little to win me over of late, with Mamma Mia! and Sex and the City failing to ignite much inside me, why should this be any different?
Well, not for nothing, the cast contains many actresses who I have liked in other films and on television, so it has that going for it. There is Amber Tamblyn who I liked on Joan of Arcadia, Alexis Bledel from Sin City (never watched much Gilmore Girls), and America Ferrera who I've like in supporting roles in films like La misma luna. As for Blake Lively, I cannot recall seeing her before. I saw Accepted but cannot place her in it. Beyond the main four actresses, the supporting cast has a number of notables, including Rachel Nichols (P2, Alias), Kyle McLachlan, Blythe Danner, and Shohreh Aghdashloo. The cast is certainly nothing to scoff at, the question was whether or not they would all come together to make a movie worth watching.
Here comes the surprise - I liked it. No, I don't think it was perfect, nor great, nor even really good. It is, however, solid. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 benefits from a cast that gels really well, sort of like, well, a well-worn pair of pants. When they are on-screen together they seem to be old friends, they may occasionally be at odds with each other, but you can still sense an unbreakable friendship between them. This is also one of the problems with the film, the basis of the film, as indicated by the title, requires the foursome to spend a good deal of time away from each other, otherwise the pants would not have to travel, would they?
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