Variety has a very well written and detailed review of Fifty Shades Darker and it's place in the franchise, though I daresay the Chicago Tribune's review is more fun.

"You taught me how to fuck, Elena. Ana taught me how to love."

A+ give it all the Oscars.

This is handsomely filmed, once again well acted by Dakota Johnson (and Jamie Dornan is much better this time), and the sex scenes are better than the first. It's definitely more drab and dull, though. For whatever reason I found the first more interesting. But I accept these movies for what they are: attractive, ridiculous smut.

All of the scenes with Kim Basinger were hilariously campy.

C

I enjoyed this a bit more than the first. You have to go into these movies just accepting that they are absolutely ridiculous trash, and if you get past that they are actually quite enjoyable. Dakota Johnson once again delivers a strong performance here, though I still think she has no chemistry with Dornan who's about as interesting as a plank of wood. Kim Basinger was absolutely hilarious, her last scene was a camp classic. It's very well-shot and put together, and the soundtrack is great as well. I'm actually looking forward to seeing what happens next A good enough time-waster, I think critics were too hard on it. B

The story never moves and the characters are dull. Probably the biggest crime in this are the sex scenes that are anything but erotic. The actors are fine but nothing what we saw in the previous movie, there are no stakes whatsoever and everything gets resolved by itself. Regardless its a gorgeous looking movie with a decent soundtrack.

3/10

A disappointment. The first is an interesting and sexy film with a clear through-line, charismatic leads, a nice ratio of absurdity to sensitivity, and a tremendous, almost avant-garde (for a mainstream romantic drama) ending inverting/subverting the dominant-submissive dynamic and empowering the heroine. I still enjoy the photogenic leads: Dakota Johnson is an enchanting presence and will, I suspect, be an enduring movie star, and I feel the frequently criticized Jamie Dornan cuts a striking, suave figure and tries to find the humanity within an over-the-top, peculiar, and at times unpleasant character. But this sequel has significant structural and storytelling flaws. It plays as a two-hour collection of half-sketched ideas and subplots: a former submissive partner of Christian's is now obsessed with and following Ana; the older woman who ushered Christian into the world of sadomasochism is attempting to sabotage his bid for a "normal" relationship; Ana has an intimidating, lecherous boss at a publishing house; etc. At one point there is even the most undramatic air crash and search-and-rescue operation in the history of cinema. Plenty of these are ripe for melodrama, perversity, and/or suspense, but none of them are satisfactorily developed, and none of them properly detonate. I forgot Kim Basinger was in the movie when not onscreen; I sense her character is meant to be a foreboding and large presence for Christian and, by extension, the audience, but she does not connect. The story involving his obsessive, suicidal prior lover ends in an incredibly anticlimactic way. In general, much of the film registers as a great deal of incident and content without direction or gravity (a wan attempt to turn a kinky love story into a "saga"), and it buries the best scenes, which are when Ana and Christian sleep together and converse and debate questions of agency, boundaries, desires, etc.

C+

Filmmaking of the worst kind. Paper thin characters are a problem, but the whole story telling doesn't go further then set-up and fizzle. The play of events taking place and leading to a sex scene become boring after two times. Even some of those scenes have some hotness to it, there's neither erotism or kink to it as it comes across wooden and tame. Which might not even be so bad but for a film where the story is uncapable of creating any drama at all it hurts it more. There's just no connect with any characters, and it all feels very empty, like a film about nothing. The soundtrack is decent though, but it can't save the film in anway.

F

Fifty Shades Darker

Yeah, this is a terrible film. Nothing really ever develops. Just more of the same melodrama from the first. The sex scenes are tame and short. Characters are introduced and then disappear. The script is fucking dire. And the acting is just an embarrassment. The two main characters are so, so, so weak. Christian is clearly a fucking psycho stalker-type who needs to spend money on a shrink, and less on cars and expensive gestures. Plus, he is just so boring. Anastasia is utterly ridiculous. She says she has her own mind but then does every single thing Christian tells her to do. And the couple as a unit is just incredibly infantile. They have a spat, then all you have to say is "I love you", and everything is fine again. That's not how life works. Was the book written by a 9-year-old girl?

I had to laugh how Christian says "I'm looking to get into publishing" as a reason for buying the company Anastasia works for. Really, in 2017, what shrewd business person is looking to get into publishing???! Anyway, just one of many, many hilariously bad things about this garbage film.

F