Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde (2003)

Elle Woods (Reese Witherspoon) is getting married to Emmett Richmond (Luke Wilson). She goes in search of her dog Bruiser Woods' parents for the wedding. She finds Bruiser's mom being tested on at V.E.R.S.A.C.E. When she objects, she's let go from her law firm. She decides to go to Washington D.C. to change the law for animal testing. She gets to work for fellow alumni Rep. Victoria Rudd (Sally Field).The first movie had the charm of something completely original. I liked the first one enough but this one doesn't have the possibility of taking us by surprise. The idea seems old now. The movie tries to put Elle Woods in the most unlikely place again. So they twist a story out of shape to put her there and make DC out to be something unreal. It isn't quite as funny anymore. At least it's not funny intentionally.

As a fan of Legally Blonde 2: Red, White and Blonde's predecessor, I avoided watching this sequel until today, and for good reason it seems. The rumours (and reviews) are true. This is an awful sequel to what was an otherwise clever and cute movie that recognised it's flaws but made light of them. This movie fails to do that, and instead ends up becoming what the first film tried to avoid: a shallow story following the unbelievable events of a caricature of a character. People who have not watched Legally Blonde 1 will not be aware of this contrast and so might view this movie differently, which seems to explain why the majority of good reviews here come from these exact same people. LB2 follows Elle Woods (Reese Withersproon), a Harvard Law graduate who is fired from her position in a prestigious Law Firm for trying to champion animal rights, after discovering that her dog Bruiser's mother is being used as a test subject in a cosmetics company. In order to have her dog's mum attend her wedding to Emmett (Luke Wilson), she heads to Washington D.C and joins the team of Congresswoman Victoria Rudd (Sally Field) to learn the ins and outs of Washington politics and to pass her 'Bruisers Bill' through congress that would see an end to the legal status of animal testing. This movie just utterly fails to capture the audience's hearts with it's preachy message, lacklustre humour and unrelatable characters who we once used to love. Gone is the Elle Woods who learned to overcome prejudice and grew into a strong-willed, self-assured, smart woman. Instead, Elle is a vapid, loudmouthed airhead who still lets people's impressions of her get her down. I thought that she would be a seasoned pro when it came to this now, but apparently she only learned how to overcome bad remarks within the University framework and nowhere beyond that. The character of Elle is a shadow of her former glory and loses that 'heart' that she had in the first film. Now all she cares about is getting a dog to attend her wedding? And this is important, how? When she first trawls into the investigators office with a proposition to find her, I was honestly left scratching my head wondering, "why?". But no. The whole film centres on her apparently gay dog Bruiser and his mum. While the idea of enrolling at university to reclaim a lost love seems unbelievable in itself, the way they executed her motives in the first film made it seem so. This time round it's just too far. Some characters from the first movie make an appearance; Emmett, who didn't even need to be in this film as he is just useless here, and her beautician friend who took a downgrade from ditsy to nearly mentally defunct for whatever reason. All of them lose their appeal and whatever relatability they had.I could have suffered through this movie if it even tried to be clever and funny but instead all we get is shallow cheap jokes and dog humour. Oh, and cheer leading in front of congress. I'm serious. I felt insulted by watching this and almost guilty that I was a fan of LB1. Was this really the character I loved and thought was endearing from the first installment? Oh my, what a fool I was. The script is severely lacking in originality and cleverness, the overall message is unnecessarily preachy and vapid, and the characters are lame. A lot of wasted opportunities with a good cast including Sally Fields and Bob Newhart.I wish I had never watched this sequel because it has now rubbed the shine off the original for me. This is just a sad, sad attempt to milk the cash cow and in doing so the creators of this film have milked everything that made the first film good and turned it sour and unpalatable. I'd give this a zero out of 10 if I could.

I had high hopes for this sequel as I found its predecessor refreshingly funny and almost original in Hollywood's seemingly never-ending quest for a genuinely funny chick-flick. This time Reese Wotherspoon's Barbie-Girl Elle Barr (a not so subtle reference to her trainee solicitor occupation) takes on the machinery of Washington over, of all things, an animal cruelty bill. Cue dozens of dogs and their owners descending on the capital to up the cute factor to super-schmaltz level...far more than the rather thin comedy this time can support.The film has far less big, laugh-out-loud moments, in fact, I'm struggling hard to think of one, off hand. Also, as a UK citizen, I found the workings of the US congress to be too confusing to follow and held back the story line. I think the movie was crying out for a big Cruella De Ville type baddie for Elle to contend with when all we get is Sally Field as Elle's congresswoman / employer who does the dirty on her through political chicanery only to capitulate before our pink heroine by the end.Wotherspoon is good to watch as before but brings nothing new to the part either in character development or indeed her wardrobe. Field isn't asked to do much and most of the rest of the cast just get to mug and goof up to the camera, while Bob Newhart, appropriately gets to give us his patented "hangdog" expression in the unlikely part of a well-connected doorman. As usual, the soundtrack offers us snippets of songs for little apparent reason.The wink Wotherspoon gives to the camera at the end as she passes the White House shows that the producers obviously had their eyes on another sequel, but thankfully this has failed to materialise, thus far, at any rate.

The first film was surprisingly good, it was funny, fluffy and warm. This sequel was not really any of these things. Apart from a nice soundtrack, one or two amusing moments like the scene at the hearing and a delightfully authentic performance from Reese Witherspoon, this film is a mess. The script is very clichéd and weak, coupled with one too many embarrassing scenes, and the direction is very by-the-numbers. The plot line is very predictable and screams of absurdity and the ending is a joke. The film isn't as striking visually either, and it could be to do with the fact the editing isn't as crisp or the scenery as beautiful. The pacing is rather slow, so I almost nodded off on occasions, and the acting with the exception of Witherspoon is not great. Sally Field is wasted, likewise with Luke Wilson while Jennifer Coolidge's part is overwritten to an embarrassing degree. Also the film is so sugary sweet it almost made my teeth twinge. So overall, disappointing and not recommended. 3/10 Bethany Cox