print versus screen: confessions of a shopaholic

so i recently watched confessions of a shopaholic, and well, it wasn't good. having read the books [at least the first three in the series] i knew that i couldn't expect too much of the story or the characters, but i love isla fisher, so i decided to give it a chance anyway.


i often wonder at how popular this series is. i mean, the books themselves are not badly written, but rebecca bloomwood has to be one of the most singularly idiotic characters ever written. from book one she has a hard time managing money, goes to crazy lengths to hide the extent of her shopping addiction and inevitably ends up hurting the people she is closest to and then making it up to them. [even bridget jones exhibited some growth in edge of reason.] and then becky does the same thing over again in shopaholic takes manhattan and in shopaholic ties the knot.


the thing is, if it were a novel about drug or alcohol addiction where the character struggles with relapses and destroys their life without everything coming up rosy in the end it would be one thing. but her addiction is played for laughs. it's serious and yet not so serious. becky never learns anything from her mistakes because there is always another credit card or another person with money willing to bail her out.


granted, i'm not sure what happens once she has a baby and finds her long-lost sister, but i can't imagine anything changes.


anyway, even though isla fisher is really charming, and hugh dancy is super-cute, the problems with the story are still there. becky is a liar and she's inconsiderate of others, she does a lot of unforgiveable things in both the books and the movie. and if i did like her better in the movie it was only because i happen to love isla fisher.

interestingly, the movie changed the setting to new york city from london, which does actually happen in the second novel. but becky was also made american instead of british. this is really only interesting because isla fisher herself is british, so i find it amusing that they had her lose her accent for this. particularly because even though it takes place in new york it really could have taken place in any big city. so why not london? there must be something with american movie audiences not going to films with british leads speaking in their british accents, because that's really the only reason that would make sense and would mean anything. since as we learn in the movie, everything is about money.

so i didn't love the movie, but i liked it better than the books. so i guess that says something.

♥♥ out of ♥♥♥♥♥♥