Sex and the City girls turn out for NYC premiere

The stars of Sex and the City 2 hit the red carpet for last night's world premiere after the first mainstream review called the film "blatantly anti-Muslim" but predicted another smash hit when it opens in the US and Britain this week.

The first movie, based on the long-running HBO TV show, was premiered in London when it opened two years ago. This time, it was New York's turn, and the place to be was the Radio City Music Hall.

The four lead actresses - Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis and Cynthia Nixon - were joined by other cast members, including the gorgeous English actress Alice Eve, who plays a nanny, Chris Noth, who again plays Mr Big, and John Corbett, whose character got left out of the first film but returns in the second as Carrie's ex, Aidan.

The fashion watchers' daggers were drawn, as always, with only Kim Cattrall getting top marks for her gold Naeem Khan dress, while the other girls' outfits were considered underwhelming.

But no outfit was vilified as much as Liza Minnelli's. The 64-year-old singer, who has a guest spot in the movie performing Beyonce's Single Ladies at a wedding, turned up in a sheer trouser suit apparently fashioned from bin liners.

As for the movie itself, the scenes that are likely to bring "anti-Muslim" accusations are set in Abu Dhabi but actually filmed in Morocco after the United Arab Emirates denied permission to shoot there. Writer and director Michael Patrick King told reporters: "Abu Dhabi was like: 'You know, the UAE is not really ready to have four sexually liberated American girls filmed here'."

The offending scenes include a karaoke version of Helen Reddy's I Am Woman, supposedly set in an Abu Dhabi nightclub, with Samantha giving her all, and a sequence in which the four stars are rescued by Muslim women who strip off their burqas to reveal stylish Western outfits hidden beneath.

"The rather scathing portrayal of Muslim society no doubt will stir controversy," wrote Stephen Farber in the Hollywood Reporter, "but there's something bracing about the film's saucy political incorrectness. Or is it politically correct?

"SATC 2 is at once proudly feminist and blatantly anti-Muslim, which means that it might confound liberal viewers."

Farber found the new film funnier and edgier than the first, with the "endearingly loopy" Abu Dhabi/Morocco scenes exhibiting "the tasteless humour that enlivened the TV series on its best nights." ·