Confessions of a Shopaholic
Confession: I don’t mind a little bit of silliness every once in a while. That’s why you’ll occasionally see me go to a movie like this. That’s why, in the grand scheme of things, I can’t really fault a movie like this fluff from testosterone producer Jerry Bruckheimer. The last time he produced a “chick flick,” it was the 2000 babe movie “Coyote Ugly.” Thankfully, this is a little better. Sure, it doesn’t take many left-hand turns, the humor is too-generic to be really funny, and let’s face it, it ends exactly how you expect it to.
So what worked for me? Start with Isla Fisher, who has a varied resume (including “Wedding Crashers,” “Definitely, Maybe,” and “The Lookout”) and a crazy fiancee in “Borat” funnyman Sascha Baron Cohen. Here, she plays Rebecca Bloomwood, and she’s a shopaholic. The only daughter of middle-class penny-pinchers (delightfully played by John Goodman and Joan Cusack), Rebecca learned a long time ago the joys of a great ensemble…and a great sale. The problem is, with great fashion sense generally comes great financial debt. So bad is her financial situation that she’s accrued over $16,000 in credit card debt, and she has a debt collector on her back for half of it. As if things couldn’t get any worse, the garden magazine she writes for is going under.
But things do seem to be looking up. She gets an interview for a position at the fashion magazine that is her Bible. But through happenstance, she ends up with an interview at a business magazine owned by the same company. The editor (Hugh Dancy) is intrigued, but it’s not until she accidentally sends a story she writes to the business magazine that she lands a job there, hoping she’ll be able to use the corporate ladder to get to her dream job. But as is the case with such things, it’s during such circumstances when what’s important starts to come to light for people.
You can probably guess what happens from there. Director P.J. Hogan (hey, he directed “My Best Friend’s Wedding”) keeps things light and entertaining while the script based on two of Sophie Kinsella’s “Shopaholic” books hits all the right notes on the way to crowd-pleasing box-office. But the cast is what delivers a winner, be it from supporting players Kristen Scott Thomas and Leslie Bibb as the snooty editor and new girl- respectively- at Rebecca’s dream job, John Lithgow as the owner the magazine conglomerate, or Krysten Ritter as Rebecca’s best friend. But the star is Fisher, whose appealing cuteness is impossible to ignore. Her film’s not that great, but trust me when I saw it’s not her fault. She’s the main reason it’s good at all.
