A Review of 50 Shades of Grey (the movie and the book)

I have to admit that I had no interest in reading the 50 Shades of Grey book(s). A friend gave them to me as a gift so with hesitation, I delved in. Now let me preface this by saying that I hated the writing style - it sounded too British for an American setting, the "Inner Goddess" stuff drove me nuts, and I wasn't a fan of Christian Grey or Anastasia, to be honest. With that said, I read all three books. They must have some kind of subliminal sorcery because I enjoyed them and I have no idea why. It's like the first few seasons of Mad Men - I liked it but I still don't know why I did.

Of course I had to see the movie and I wasn't disappointed. I actually thought it was well-done and was much less annoying than the books - books I enjoyed, I might add.

I have seen so many people making fun of the whole franchise and that's fine. However, even though this is not the genre I read, it is a force to be reckoned with. With so many people reading these books, people who may not even be your typical reader, it has a power that gets people into books again. As far as the movie, it made over $85 million on its opening weekend so make fun all you want.

As far as the theme, I don't see a girl who was necessarily taken advantage of or who was abused; everything was consensual. Yes, he went too far at times - that is part of the story. However, this is a fictional book so why all the anger over it? If your teenager thinks it is how true love really is and thinks that every guy is Christian Grey, he or she is mentally too young to see the movie in the first place - or read the books for that matter.

I don't usually like romance books or movies but I have to admit that I liked these so judge me all you want.