Click to play videoCast: Isla Fisher, Hugh Dancy
Direction: PJ Hogan
For all those women who enjoyed the Sex And The City movie, here comes another vacuous comedy in which Prada bags and Gucci boots play supporting roles.
Confessions of a Shopaholic stars Isla Fisher as Rebecca Bloomwood, a New York journalist obsessed with buying clothes and shoes, who's determined to land a job at a prestigious fashion magazine so she can pay off her ridiculous credit-card bills. When she misses her chance, she settles for a foot in the door, a job at a financial magazine where she becomes an overnight star on the strength of her first piece – a column on personal saving, of all things.
For a film that's intended as a cautionary tale about the dangers of overspending, Confessions of a Shopaholic is shockingly hypocritical even as it takes you in and out of upscale stores like Bloomingdale's and Henri Bendel, working up your appetite for all the expensive designer bags and shoes and clothes that are dangled temptingly in front of your eyes for close to two hours.
As a journalist, I found this film particularly insulting for the ease with which Rebecca lands a job as a columnist in a money management magazine despite knowing zilch about the subject and caring even less. It makes you wonder: how dumb were the other journalists who didn't get the job?
The tone of the film is frothy and frivolous, the plot is glaringly predictable, and I suspect for all straight men this film will be pure punishment. The romantic track between Rebecca and her boss Luke (played by Brit actor Hugh Dancy) seems almost obligatory; and the comedy – which involves dodging a debt collector, a slapstick dance number, and an exploding closet full of clothes – is pedestrian to say the least.
The film's leading lady, Isla Fisher has an endearing charm about her, and the only reason I didn't walk out of the screening half way is because I was engaged by her knack for physical comedy – she's the ditziest, klutziest girl to walk through the door since Cameron Diaz, and it's the only reason this film isn't entirely a waste of time.
For me though, the film had only one genuinely funny scene and it's the one in which Rebecca attends a Shopaholics Anonymous meeting where she gushes about the delights of buying new things to a group of recovering shopping addicts who, as a result, head straight to the nearest fashion boutique – it's the wittiest written scene in this brainless chick-flick.
I'm going with one out of five for Confessions of a Shopaholic; it doesn't have the charm of Devil Wears Prada and lacks even the guilty pleasure provided by Sex And The City. I'd say avoid it, but I realise I'm not the target audience for this film. So watch it at your own risk. Or if you get turned on by Armani and Versace.
Rating: 1 / 5 (Poor)
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