DVD Review: CONFESSIONS OF A SHOPAHOLIC (Touchstone)

Mike LoManaco

Studio Name: Touchstone
MPAA Rating: PG
Disc/Transfer Information: Widescreen 2.40:1
Tested Audio Track: English Dolby Digital 5.1
Director: PJ Hogan
Starring Cast: Isla Fisher, Hugh Dancy, John Goodman

LoMANACO'S PLOT ANALYSIS:

The only reason to watch this wanna-be followup to Devil Wears Prada -- aside from your squeeze holding a Smith & Wesson to your cranium -- is to take in the deliciously cute and sexy Isla Fisher who runs around in this wearing the skimpiest and shortest of dresses combined with the highest of heels, combining to make any male with a pulse start feeling a familiar throb below the belt...

But I digress. Boy, was this the ultimate chick flick -- if you've got a ****, you're automatically, by default, going to like this...at least that's my theory. Reviewing this on standard DVD for multiple publications -- and now for High Def Forum -- wasn't an easy task given the subject material, but we are indeed saved from the rigors of **** life in that the running time for Shopaholic clocks in at 105 minutes. Based on a novel of the same name, as well as Shopaholic Takes Manhattan, the story has almost the exact same pace and character study as the aforementioned Devil Wears Prada: The gorgeous Isla Fisher (who made all the boys' members throb in Wedding Crashers as she gyrated on Vince Vaughn's lap in a miniskirt and exclaimed "I'm not wearing any panties!") plays Becky Bloomwood in a role parallel with Anne Hathaway's in Prada in that she is a down-on-her-luck New York journalist who wants to write for a prestigious fashion magazine, yet is up to her panty lines in debt because she cannot control how much she spends shopping on clothes. This must have been a real tampon-cramming party for girls who got together to watch this when it came out, as the entire film centers around the antics, customs and rituals that go into these real women that really cannot control the spending on shoes and handbags -- Fisher's condition is so bad that she actually thinks the mannequins in store windows are summoning her and telling her what to buy. If you think I am kidding, fellas, I'm not. Be careful who you watch this with.

Becky's idiotic roommate, who lives with her boyfriend all together in the apartment, sees the problems Fisher's character has with her spending, but her bubbly, babbling demeanor as the two of them go through Becky's wardrobe and debt counts is so annoying you can almost vomit. With over $9,000 in debt from maxing out credit cards, Becky doesn't get a job with the fashion magazine, but a financial magazine located in the same New York office run by the same mother company -- something I personally know about. The problem is, she lies her way into an interview there, as she knows nothing about finance, and after a really odd first meeting with her new boss (played annoyingly by Hugh Dancy) she begins, of course, falling for him. As she settles into her new job in a cubicle with this magazine and receives her first assignments, she is called out by Dancy when she copies material straight from a "Finance for Dummies" book. I just didn't get the attraction Fisher's character had for this guy -- he comes into work, the head of a magazine, every day looking disheveled and unshaven with a hairdo that looks like it hasn't seen any L.A. Style gel in about a century. Add to that his annoying British drone and by this point most anyone with a **** will be reaching for the STOP button on your Blu-ray/DVD player remote.

At any rate, Fisher's character has a debt collector constantly stalking her through the film, first on the phone and then in person, but she pawns it off to her co-workers and boss as it being a sick ex-boyfriend pretending to be a collector and simply stalking her. Dancy's character buys it hook, line and sinker, and strangely begins taking Fisher to finance conferences in New York and then Florida, irrespective of her lack of education in the finance sector. In the real world, this would be cause for being fired; in Hollywood film making, this girl is getting more respect from her boss in addition to benefits. Go figure. John Goodman, the fat **** that he is, turns in a performance as Fisher's father, who along with her mother, trade in their retirement savings to buy a rusty trailer home. Meanwhile, Fisher hands in an article entitled "The Girl in the Green Scarf," a name inspired by a -- you guessed it -- a green scarf she purchased which has apparently made ripples in the financial community. John Lithgow plays the owner of the magazine conglomerate that owns the finance magazine, and he is impressed with her article -- in fact, somehow, some way, news of "The Girl in the Green Scarf" gets international exposure and begins earning a whirlwind reputation. I didn't get it either.

Along the way, Fisher's character continues to cave in her desire to spend on every piece of Prada she encounters, until she gets into Shopper's Anonymous (yes, these groups actually exist) where she meets an eccentric group of weirdos who can't put down their credit cards either. Things get complicated when Fisher and Dancy really fall for each other (like you couldn't see this coming) and Dancy finds out that all she wanted was to use her job with his finance magazine to get into the fashion publication a few floors up in the same building. Now, for some reason I didn't really care about, her roommate is mad at her too just days before her wedding, and in a comical twist towards the end, Fisher is forced to sell her ridiculous looking bridesmaid dress and other items to a thrift store by members of her Shopper's Anonymous group. Does she get the dress back in time for the roommate's wedding? Does the roommate let her back into her good graces? Does she finally hook up with her disheveled boss even though he feels like she betrayed him? What happens when she goes on a television show to promote "The Girl in the Green Scarf" and the psycho debt collector is in the audience? Does she finally sell all the **** in her apartment in order to pay the collector off in pennies? And what does she do when the Miranda Priestly-knockoff editor of the fashion magazine she so desperately wants to write for comes to her parents' house and offers her a job writing her own column? Does she take it -- or does she become stereotypically conscious and take the high ground by refusing it and finally "growing up?"

Perhaps the question should be...Do you actually care?

VIDEO QUALITY:

As with most recent vintage DVD titles, Confessions of a Shopaholic upscaled nicely on my Panasonic Blu-ray player to 1080p; of course, it wasn't high def, but the image was surprisingly clean and free of compression artifacts or macroblocking. The 2.40:1 image from Touchstone was rich in color, exhibiting the wild range of hues in the fashion industry in a loud, aggressive expression. Oranges, reds and pinks were loud and saturated, and everything just looked clean for upscaled DVD. I did notice -- due solely to the poor scaling of my Panny player -- mild to severe jaggies through many images throughout the transfer, but in general it indeed looked very good for standard definition.

AUDIO QUALITY:

The English Dolby Digital 5.1 track was the usual fare for this genre -- that is to say, nothing was going on. The mix was on the hushed side in terms of overall volume, without much "gain" to it and even the bubble gum pop/club soundtrack accompanying many of the scenes didn't arrive in the front channels with that much punch or bass. Surround usage was non-existent, as I detected with Fox's DVD release of Devil Wears Prada as well, save for one brief moment that I can't even recall anymore.

LoMANACO'S SUMMARY:

Really? Do I need to do this? If you liked Devil Wears Prada this may be your pair of stilettos -- if not, don't go beyond a rental.

LoMANACO'S RECOMMENDATIONS:

I'll sum it up in two words: WOMEN ONLY.

Thanks, as always, for reading friends, and please fire away with any commentary!

bobman1235

I actually liked the Devil Wears Prada.

Mike LoManaco

Oh Jesus Christ on the Cross...:eek:

Mike LoManaco

I would also like to add -- being that it slipped my mind when doing the review -- that JERRY BRUCKHEIMER actually produced Confessions, which seemed odd to me in that the last time he attempted a production of this sort, it was the Denis Leary comedy The Ref.

McLoki

I actually watched this last night with the wife... Review was spot on except it was much worse than Devil wears Prada (which for a chick flick, was not that bad). On my rating scale - I would put Confessions more at 3.5-4 on a scale of 1-10.....

Michael

Edit - For the record - the wife felt about the same as I did. Ok rental (if there is nothing else you want to watch) but no desire to watch again and very glad we did not spend the bucks to see it in the theater......

Mike LoManaco

McLoki wrote: »

I actually watched this last night with the wife... Review was spot on except it was much worse than Devil wears Prada (which for a chick flick, was not that bad). On my rating scale - I would put Confessions more at 3.5-4 on a scale of 1-10.....

Thank you for your comments, Loki!

Indeed, perhaps I was a bit harsh on Prada; we actually watch that DVD often because the fiance loves it and it is a "tolerable" **** flick (as I like to call them now) -- but this was hard to sit through what with the childish behavior from Fisher and her roommate, the unplausable scenarios at jobs and the overall idiotic mannerisms and language from the female cast.

Thanks again for your thoughts on the review and title!

Mike LoManaco

Mike LoManaco wrote: »

Studio Name: Touchstone
MPAA Rating: PG
Disc/Transfer Information: Widescreen 2.40:1
Tested Audio Track: English Dolby Digital 5.1
Director: PJ Hogan
Starring Cast: Isla Fisher, Hugh Dancy, John Goodman

LoMANACO'S PLOT ANALYSIS:

The only reason to watch this wanna-be followup to Devil Wears Prada -- aside from your squeeze holding a Smith & Wesson to your cranium -- is to take in the deliciously cute and sexy Isla Fisher who runs around in this wearing the skimpiest and shortest of dresses combined with the highest of heels, fusing to make any male with a pulse start feeling a familiar throb below the belt...

But I digress. Boy, was this the ultimate chick flick -- if you've got a ****, you're automatically, by default, going to like this...at least that's my theory. Reviewing this on standard DVD for multiple publications -- and now for Club Polk -- wasn't an easy task given the subject material, but we are indeed saved from the rigors of **** life in that the running time for Shopaholic clocks in at 105 minutes. Based on a novel of the same name, as well as Shopaholic Takes Manhattan, the story has almost the exact same pace and character study as the aforementioned Devil Wears Prada: The gorgeous Isla Fisher (who made all the boys' members throb in Wedding Crashers as she gyrated on Vince Vaughn's lap in a miniskirt and exclaimed "I'm not wearing any panties!") plays Becky Bloomwood in a role parallel with Anne Hathaway's in Prada in that she is a down-on-her-luck New York journalist who wants to write for a prestigious fashion magazine, yet is up to her panty lines in debt because she cannot control how much she spends shopping on clothes. This must have been a real tampon-cramming party for girls who got together to watch this when it came out, as the entire film centers around the antics, customs and rituals that go into these real women that really cannot control the spending on shoes and handbags -- Fisher's condition is so bad that she actually thinks the mannequins in store windows are summoning her and telling her what to buy. If you think I am kidding, fellas, I'm not. Be careful who you watch this with.

Becky's idiotic roommate, who lives with her boyfriend all together in the apartment, sees the problems Fisher's character has with her spending, but her bubbly, babbling demeanor as the two of them go through Becky's wardrobe and debt counts is so annoying you can almost vomit. With over $9,000 in debt from maxing out credit cards, Becky doesn't get a job with the fashion magazine, but a financial magazine located in the same New York office run by the same mother company -- something I personally know about. The problem is, she lies her way into an interview there, as she knows nothing about finance, and after a really odd first meeting with her new boss (played annoyingly by Hugh Dancy) she begins, of course, falling for him. As she settles into her new job in a cubicle with this magazine and receives her first assignments, she is called out by Dancy when she copies material straight from a "Finance for Dummies" book. I just didn't get the attraction Fisher's character had for this guy -- he comes into work, the head of a magazine, every day looking disheveled and unshaven with a hairdo that looks like it hasn't seen any L.A. Style gel in about a century. Add to that his annoying British drone and by this point most anyone with a **** will be reaching for the STOP button on your Blu-ray/DVD player remote.

At any rate, Fisher's character has a debt collector constantly stalking her through the film, first on the phone and then in person, but she pawns it off to her co-workers and boss as it being a sick ex-boyfriend pretending to be a collector and simply stalking her. Dancy's character buys it hook, line and sinker, and strangely begins taking Fisher to finance conferences in New York and then Florida, irrespective of her lack of education in the finance sector. In the real world, this would be cause for being fired; in Hollywood film making, this girl is getting more respect from her boss in addition to benefits. Go figure. John Goodman, the fat **** that he is, turns in a performance as Fisher's father, who along with her mother, trade in their retirement savings to buy a rusty trailer home. Meanwhile, Fisher hands in an article entitled "The Girl in the Green Scarf," a name inspired by a -- you guessed it -- a green scarf she purchased which has apparently made ripples in the financial community. John Lithgow plays the owner of the magazine conglomerate that owns the finance magazine, and he is impressed with her article -- in fact, somehow, some way, news of "The Girl in the Green Scarf" gets international exposure and begins earning a whirlwind reputation. I didn't get it either.

Along the way, Fisher's character continues to cave in her desire to spend on every piece of Prada she encounters, until she gets into Shopper's Anonymous (yes, these groups actually exist) where she meets an eccentric group of weirdos who can't put down their credit cards either. Things get complicated when Fisher and Dancy really fall for each other (like you couldn't see this coming) and Dancy finds out that all she wanted was to use her job with his finance magazine to get into the fashion publication a few floors up in the same building. Now, for some reason I didn't really care about, her roommate is mad at her too just days before her wedding, and in a comical twist towards the end, Fisher is forced to sell her ridiculous looking bridesmaid dress and other items to a thrift store by members of her Shopper's Anonymous group. Does she get the dress back in time for the roommate's wedding? Does the roommate let her back into her good graces? Does she finally hook up with her disheveled boss even though he feels like she betrayed him? What happens when she goes on a television show to promote "The Girl in the Green Scarf" and the psycho debt collector is in the audience? Does she finally sell all the **** in her apartment in order to pay the collector off in pennies? And what does she do when the Miranda Priestly-knockoff editor of the fashion magazine she so desperately wants to write for comes to her parents' house and offers her a job writing her own column? Does she take it -- or does she become stereotypically conscious and take the high ground by refusing it and finally "growing up?"

Perhaps the question should be...Do you actually care?

VIDEO QUALITY:

As with most recent vintage DVD titles, Confessions of a Shopaholic upscaled nicely on my Panasonic Blu-ray player to 1080p; of course, it wasn't high def, but the image was surprisingly clean and free of compression artifacts or macroblocking. The 2.40:1 image from Touchstone was rich in color, exhibiting the wild range of hues in the fashion industry in a loud, aggressive expression. Oranges, reds and pinks were loud and saturated, and everything just looked clean for upscaled DVD. I did notice -- due solely to the poor scaling of my Panny player -- mild to severe jaggies through many images throughout the transfer, but in general it indeed looked very good for standard definition.

AUDIO QUALITY:

The English Dolby Digital 5.1 track was the usual fare for this genre -- that is to say, nothing was going on. The mix was on the hushed side in terms of overall volume, without much "gain" to it and even the bubble gum pop/club soundtrack accompanying many of the scenes didn't arrive in the front channels with that much punch or bass. Surround usage was non-existent, as I detected with Fox's DVD release of Devil Wears Prada as well, save for one brief moment that I can't even recall anymore.

LoMANACO'S SUMMARY:

Really? Do I need to do this? If you liked Devil Wears Prada this may be your pair of stilettos -- if not, don't go beyond a rental.

LoMANACO'S RECOMMENDATIONS:

I'll sum it up in two words: WOMEN ONLY.

Thanks, as always, for reading friends, and please fire away with any commentary!

EDIT: Please excuse the few errors I have corrected in this review; I could not, for some reason, access the Edit tool when doing this, so I have quoted the entire review and made the changes in BOLD above. Thank you, and my apologies for the initial mistakes.

McLoki

You only have 10-20min to edit posts then they are there forever unless you ask a moderator to edit for you.

(yea, we all hate that rule)

Michael

Mike LoManaco

McLoki wrote: »

You only have 10-20min to edit posts then they are there forever unless you ask a moderator to edit for you.

(yea, we all hate that rule)

Michael

Thanks Michael; it is true you learn something every day!

That IS a strange rule...