“Confessions of a Shopaholic” Pretty Lame

Pretty Lame

“Hotshots” looks at a movie!

CONFESSIONS OF A SHOPAHOLIC starts off bad, goes downhill from there, and then manages to redeem itself just enough that all in all it is not good, not bad, but just okay.

This says something about a movie that, after all, is making fun of what is a serious problem for some people.

No, I am not talking about compulsive behavior that causes some people to spend money beyond their means. I am talking about the compulsion that some people have to search for romantic love.

Isla Fisher plays Rebecca Greenwood, a young and attractive magazine writer in New York City who discovered the power of shopping when she was a little girl and the fact that you didn’t have to pay money for anything if you had a “magic card,” which is what she called a credit card.

Now she has 12 of them and the bills to prove it.

To explain her compulsive behavior, Rebecca says, “When I shop, the world gets better, and then it’s not anymore and I need to do it again.”

When the magazine that Rebecca works for fails, she buys an expensive green scarf that she cannot afford for an interview with a fashion magazine for a job that she believes will make her happy forever if she gets it.

Then through a series of ridiculous setups and even more ridiculous payoffs, Rebecca is hired to be a columnist for a financial magazine and to write about how to save money.

Hugh Dancy plays Luke Brandon, the editor of the magazine whom Rebecca lied to about her credentials, and so now she is in serious trouble, right?

Wrong. Rebecca’s even more serious problem is that she has a bill collector after her who she tells Luke is an ex-boyfriend who is stalking her.

So, Rebecca is advising people about debt and she is up to her eyeballs in it, she lied about herself to her editor to get the job, she has a bill collector after her, and what else could go wrong?

Well, for one thing she attends a meeting of Shopaholics Anonymous and when she talks about shopping, she causes all the other members to relapse.

CONFESSIONS OF A SHOPAHOLIC is pretty lame from beginning to end, but if you’re a sucker for romance–and who isn’t–it redeems itself.

I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”