Occasionally a film comes along that's light and frothy which still makes a huge cultural impact.
David Frankel's 2006 comedy drama 'The Devil Wears Prada' was that kind of movie.
It wasn't a great journalism film like Billy Wilder's 'Ace In The Hole' or Alan J Pakula's 'All The President's Men'.
Its story wasn't very taxing.
But it did look good and it had memorable performances from Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt, Stanley Tucci and Meryl Streep who picked up a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy.
More importantly for the studio, Frankel's $41 million 2003 adaptation of Lauren Weisberger's novel made a shed load of money for 20th Century Fox - $326 million to be precise.
Twenty years is a long time to wait for a sequel, though.
But if Tim Burton's 'Beetlejuice Beetlejuice' could earn $452 million on a $100 million budget for Warner Bros 36 years after its original with the same director, then surely 'The Devil Wears Prada 2' could do likewise?
In terms of box office, it seems the answer to that question is yes.
Two weeks after its theatrical release, Frankel's sequel has raced to a $453 million box office intake on exactly the same budget as Burton's sequel.
But while money unquestionably talks in Hollywood, does Frankel's sequel manage to conjure up the same magic in the way Burton's sequel did?
At the end of Frankel's film, Anne Hathaway's aspiring journalist Andy Sachs walked away on a point of principle from a coveted job as an assistant to Meryl Streep's Miranda Priestley, the feared and formidable editor-in-chief of the fashion magazine, Runway.
Twenty years on from the first movie, the media landscape has changed with fashion magazines and news outlets struggling to compete with the rise of the social media influencer.
Frankel and his screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna have no option but to acknowledge that fact and they do .
As Andy picks up a current affairs journalism award at a swanky New York luncheon, she and her newsroom colleagues learn they've been sacked from their publication.
Forced to find a new job, Andy's impassioned speech about the state of journalism at the awards goes viral and catches the eye of BJ Novak's Jay Ravitz who draws it to the attention of his father, Tibor Feldman's Ira Rabitz who owns Runway.
Runway is facing its challenges too, migrating online.
Streep's Miranda Priestly is also on the back foot over a puff piece about a fashion brand that it soon emerges has been reliant on sweatshop labour.
The Rabitzs woo Andy to restore credibility to Runway, hiring her as the features editor and while she is welcomed back with open arms by Stanley Tucci's fashion and art editor Nigel Kipling, Priestly is typically frosty.
That is until Andy lands a much sought after interview with Lucy Liu's Sasha Barnes, the reclusive ex wife of a high profile Silicon Valley billionaire.
Sasha's ex is Justin Theroux's Benji Barnes who is dating Emily Blunt's former Runway assistant Emily Charlton who now works for Dior, a key advertiser for the magazine.
With the Rabitz family thinking of selling Runway, the action shifts from New York to Milan Fashion Week, with Andy and Emily plotting a takeover of the magazine by Benji that could secure Runway's future.
But does everything go according to plan?
Part of the charm of the original 'The Devil Wears Prada' was Andy's strong sense of right and wrong which saw her walk away from Runway in protest at the way Miranda had ruthlessly betrayed her right hand man, Nigel.
Having her walk back into the same environment because she needs the money is a bit of a climbdown and it just about scrapes credibility.
Frankel's film, however, repeatedly rides roughshod over Andy's integrity as she quickly settles back into the fickle, glossy world of fashion journalism, accepting freebies and trying to impress her ruthless boss.
Given the opportunity by a publisher to write an expose of Priestly, Andy resists and still tries to seek Miranda's approval like a child trying to impress a loathsome parent.
She ignores the editor-in-chief's shortcomings and in fact, she actually tries to advance Miranda's ambition to become the global head of content at Ira and Jay's media conglomerate.
It's not only Andy's character who feels compromised, though.
Blunt's Emily Charlton suffers too, showing very little progression from the 2006 original, despite having left Runway to forge her own career.
Streep's Miranda Priestly has become even more of a pantomime act, with the three time Oscar winner asked to rehash her icy, aloof stare from the first film in a performance that becomes more and more ''Ab Fab'' as it wears on.
While Hathaway, Blunt and Streep rather surprisingly flounder, some of the newer characters also splash about aimlessly.
Theroux, as usual, overacts as a tech bro who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.
Novak kind of comes and goes, making very little impression.
Kenneth Branagh turns up as Miranda's acclaimed classical violinist husband, Stuart Simmons and doesn't really have a role that allows him to contribute very much to film.
The same is true for Aussie actor Peter Brammal who some audiences may know from the sitcom 'Colin From Accounts' who plays a developer who captures Andy's heart.
Lucy Liu suffers the same fate too, while Tracie Thoms returns as Andy's best friend Lily to big up the main character just like she did in the original.
The movie is packed with knowing cameos from the likes of Lady GaGa, Donatella Versace, Marc Jacobs, Heidi Klum, Naomi Campbell, Jon Batiste and rather surprisingly Rory McIlroy.
However it's all a bit meh, even if Stanley Tucci's return as Nigel is oddly comforting.
As you'd expect, Frankel's film looks terrific, thanks to Molly Rogers' costume design, Jess Gonchor's production design and Florian Ballhaus' cinematography.
There's a typically fizzy soundtrack with needle drops from Madonna, Olivia Dean, SZA, Miley Cyrus, Raye and, of course, Lady GaGa
However if you strip away the glitz and the glamour, all you'll find is a sequel that is every bit hollow and unfunny as the 'Sex and the City' spin-off movies.
And while it may not be one of Robert Altman's greatest movies, Frankel's sequel did have me hankering for the spiteful humour of his star studded, withering 1994 fashion industry satire 'Pret A Porter' which outguns anything Frankel and McKenna manage to serve up here.
In the 20 years since its predecessor, 'The Devil Wears Prada' appears to have lost its compass by somehow treating Priestly as if she is some kind of national and international treasure.
And maybe that speaks volumes about how much we have regressed in the past 20 years.
('The Devil Wears Prada 2' was released in UK and Irish cinemas on May 1, 2026)
Sometimes it's possible to not love a film but admire a performance at the heart of it.
That's what happens with Mary Bronstein's psychological drama 'If I Had Legs I'd Kick You' which deservedly earned its star Rose Byrne a Best Actress Oscar nomination.
Byrne plays Linda, a psychologist who appears to be on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
Stretched to the point of exhaustion, she tries to forge a career while tending to a very demanding daughter, voiced offscreen for much of the film by Delaney Quinn, who has a disorder that requires the nightly use of a feeding tube.
It doesn't help that her husband, Christian Slater's Charles is often away from home working as the captain of a ship at sea.
Linda and her daughter are forced to leave their home in Monatauk and live in a motel when their apartment ceiling collapses .
At work, she has to contend with a patient, Danielle Macdonald's Caroline who abandons her young son in one therapy session, leaving Linda to scramble around trying to get someone to take the boy home.
Linda offloads in sessions with Conan O'Brien's rather therapist who seeems rather indifferent to her problems.
Struggling with sleep deprivation, she is seduced by ASAP Rocky's motel employee Jamie's offer to help her find her drugs on the dark web.
Simply overwhelmed by everything, for much of the movie Linda teeters on the brink of completely losing it.
But what happens if she does?
Stressed out parents will no doubt sympathise with Linda's predicament in the film and Byrne does a terrific job conveying a mother struggling to hold a career and a challenging family life together.
Bronstein, her film editor Lucian Johnston and cinematographer Christopher Messina also do an impressive job constructing an increasingly surreal tale.
However it's not a very enjoyable experience and the constant sound of Linda's understandably needy child begging her to tend to her needs is grating - even if that's exactly the point.
Putting its audience in a fight or flight mode, some viewers will no doubt choose the latter - preferring to watch something much lighter than Bro stein's misery fest.
Each will find their own cinematic comfort blanket.
Although, as you will have seen, I'm not convinced 'The Devil Wears Prada 2' is the tonic they should turn to.
('If I Had Legs I'd Kick You' was released in UK and Irish cinemas on February 20, 2026 and is available for streaming on the BFI Player from April 2, 2026)
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