Fifty Shades Freed

Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan return for a third and final torturous turn as bondage fiends Anastasia Steele and Christian Grey. While there is supposed to be a plot, Fifty Shades Freed is really just an assemblage of asinine, soul-decimating moments that leave a bad taste in your entire body. Here’s a quick starter list of some of the things Fifty Shades Freed totally ruined for me: Seattle, Audis, Paul McCartney’s “Maybe I’m Amazed” (Dornan sits down at a piano to sing this in a true WTF moment), David Bowie’s “Young Americans” (I heard it playing while Anastasia and Christian were eating steak), steak, butt plugs (actually, kind of OK having this one ruined for me), Dodge Durangos, Aspen, women, men, Mickey Mouse (he’s on my watch face, which I was constantly checking), Don Johnson and Melanie Griffith (they are Dakota Johnson’s parents, and I’m holding them personally responsible), the color red, sexy architects, sonograms, and the English language. The movie is set in Seattle. I wanted Mount Rainier—that gigantic, nasty-looking, long-dormant volcano—to erupt. This franchise is selling a gazillion dollars in tickets. Surely, they could’ve spent an extra hundred million for a volcanic eruption sequence where Christian and Anastasia get buried in molten lava while playing with vibrators in their torture room. I would’ve upgraded my popcorn rating to a fair for that. The movie is directed by James Foley, who helmed such classics as At Close Range and, for Christ’s sake, Glengarry Glen Ross. Let’s put this in perspective, the guy directed the Alec Baldwin “Brass Balls” speech, and now he’s directing Seattle-based butt plug mayhem. Oh, wait, check that, he also directed Madonna’s “Who’s That Girl,” so the seeds of suck were planted in the late ’80s. The bastard has come full circle.