Who stole the old Carrie? Our review of Sex and the City 2

SATC2 an enjoyable romp but we can't help wondering if Carrie has lost her personality.

Still stunning: Sarah Jessica Parker, Kristin Davis, Kim Cattrall, and Cynthia Nixon at the London premiere of Sex and the City 2 / AP

IF you were Charlotte, Miranda or Samantha, you would have have slapped Carrie by now.

A decade later and here we are, back in the Big/Aidan Bermuda love triangle - where Carrie’s sense of self is ultimately what disappears.

And Aidan deserves a wake-up-to-yourself shake as well, this is the woman who sunk her Manolo Blahniks into your still-beating heart not once, but twice.

When the TV series lfirst aired, Carrie epitomised girl power (before the phrase became naff).

She was independent, refusing to settle, talented, honest and surrounded by true love (in the form of her three breakfast-buddy soul mates). We ladies finally had a worthy heroine.

But her move to the er, big, screen has been marked by an identity loss.

Even she admits in this film that she spent years trying to get the man she loved to love her back.

Did she just wear Big down? Was that why he agreed to marry her?

Sure you can laugh at the many and hilarious jokes throughout this comedy romp (the puns alone are pure genius), but the heart and soul of it is just plain wrong.

Carrie continues to diminish herself for love, or what she perceives as love.

While the other girls learn to love themselves enough to put their needs first every now and then, to accept that they won’t always be the perfect women they’d once imagined, Carrie keeps trying to find her sense of self in her relationships.

Sex and the City 2 trots out the typical American view of the Islamic faith and customs - the arrogance to think that the Red, White and Blue is the only valid way of looking at things, that all Islamic women must be oppressed and the men are Neanderthals, incapable of rational thought.

But I can’t help wondering if Carrie’s actually the one who’s oppressed - and she’s choosing to do it to herself.

It’s not all bad news for the film. It’s perfection in parts, bringing back all those nostalgic memories of Monday nights spent in front of the box.

The chemistry between the gals is still there. The fashion is fabulous, the scenery incredible, and Samantha’s antics never lose their charm.

A performance from Liza Minnelli at a certain wedding is a show-stopper – what pins for an old broad!