SYNOPSIS: In “The Devil Wears Prada 2,” the twenty-years-in-the-making sequel to the 2006 Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway and Emily Blunt hit, Andy Sachs returns to Runway Magazine as Miranda Priestly navigates the new world of media. “Well, look what TJ Maxx dragged in,” says Nigel (Stanley Tucci).
CAST: Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt, and Stanley Tucci, Justin Theroux, Kenneth Branagh. Directed by David Frankel.
REVIEWS: The clever callbacks and echoes of the past in “The Devil Wears Prada 2” should satisfy fans of the original but may leave series newcomers with a case of the cerulean blues. (Fans will get the joke.)
The movie begins in a much different world from the 2006 movie. Journalism is under fire and the formerly high-flying world of fashion magazines has been grounded, relegated to creating “content for people to scroll past while they pee.”
Even Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep), editor-in-chief of the formerly formidable magazine “Runway,” feels the pinch. She still has a beautiful corner office, longtime right-hand Nigel Kipling (Stanley Tucci) and a withering attitude toward her staff, but these days she is reduced to hanging up her own coat rather than tossing it one of her assistants.
Fate brings together Miranda and her former second assistant Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) in a perfect storm of journalism woes. Andy loses her job as an investigative reporter just as Miranda is accused of failing to fact check a story about a fashion company that secretly uses sweat shops to produce their clothes.
Much to Miranda’s consternation, “Runway’s” owner hires Andy as Features Editor hoping that her standard of journalistic excellence will rehabilitate the magazine’s tattered reputation. “All I have to do is bide my time until you fail,” Miranda says disdainfully, “and you will.”
Andy’s job at the magazine is to “turn on new readers without turning off old readers,” which, coincidentally, is also director David Frankel’s job with the film’s viewers.
For the most part he succeeds.
The script, by Aline Brosh McKenna, who also wrote the original, follows a similar structure to the first film, placing Andy, once again, as an eager outsider in the exotic world inhabited by Miranda, Nigel and Emily. Frankel puts the band—Streep, Hathaway, Tucci, and Blunt—back together, keeping the traits that made them popular in the first place, while allowing them to grow.
Fans will get a boatload of Miranda’s dismissive remarks, Andy’s puppy dog energy and ambition, Nigel’s quiet mentorship and Emily’s judgmental edge, but all are tweaked. Miranda has vulnerabilities, Andy is more confident, Nigel is an avatar for the changing industry and Emily is still fiercely fashionable and wants to please Miranda but has a modicum of power she didn’t have before.
Reunited, the characters fit together like puzzle pieces, but it is the movie’s macro focus that gives “The Devil Wears Prada 2” its juice.
Of course, the characters click and there are beautiful, over-the-top clothes, but that’s not the point. Amid the laughs and emotional plot turns, mixed in with the runway drama, is a timely, love letter to the importance of journalism. The gloomy picture the movie paints of the future of journalism and media outlets is unexpected, and seemingly at odds with the glamourous backdrop, but it adds a dose of maturity to the story. The audience has grown up and so have the characters and the situation.
“The Devil Wears Prada 2” has style and substance. It isn’t as light and fluffy as the original but has a modern tone that reflects where the world and the characters are today. It’s still a bit of a fairy tale, with callbacks and nostalgia, but a grounded one that fans should enjoy.
