What [not] to watch: Confessions of a Shopaholic

Looking for a bit of relax between school and wedding preparations, I decided to watch a movie and came across "Confessions of a Shopaholic". (On my to-watch list: Lisence to Wed and Bride Wars).


The movie is about a girl who is a shopaholic at the beginning, isn't anymore at the end, and becomes a financial journalist in between. It's light-hearted, but not really funny, and stupid, but not to a bang-my-head-against-the-wall degree.

A few cliches appear:

1. Lying leads to funny situations.
2. Lying always catches up on you, but things get fixed in 10 minutes. Mostly by themselves - just sit and cry.
3. Prince Charming always appears next to you on the street when you need it the most but expect it the least.
4. Lack of education isn't lack of competence, but a fresh point of view.
5. The rich handsome guy is the one. He'll date someone else for a while, but that's just because he doesn't know he's the one yet. He'll find out soon, just wait.
6. You'll have major achievements in your first month at your new job.
7. Revenge is cool. (Hello? Hasn't our civilization gone a bit further?)
   

Well, I guess that if I'm so tired of those cliches, it's my fault, as I pick such movies. Still, it would be great to see something light-hearted (life is too much stress to watch stressful movies, as for me) but with... er... a fresh point of view! (Hey, why not hire a shopaholic to make your next movie?)


I still "learned" a few things from this movie.

For instance, getting out of debt is really easy. Just show yourself on national TV, speak about frugality and everyone will come running to shop for your stuff.

Also, you can get a job as a journalist without showing a piece of your work. Honestly, I wouldn't hire someone who hasn't got his own blog! Okay, maybe except if that person had good reasons... but anyone can start a blog, and you really get to show your best on yours. You have no boss to please and take full credit and responsibility for your words. Is there a better way of finding out if a journalist is worth hiring than reading his blog?

The biggest finding of all, actually, was that googling before writing an article is unethical. To me, not doing so would be. If you're speaking, listen as well! Besides, the blogosphere and other medias create kind of a world wide dialogue. If you're talking about some subject, please find out what others said about it recently. Don't rediscover the wheel.

Well... I'm a bit hypocritical right now. I haven't read a single review of that movie before writing one. But that's because I learned another valuable lesson: being hypocritical is okay (or will turn out okay, anyway). Kinda from the protagonist, who's giving financial advice between crazy shopping sprees, and kinda from the movie itself: the girl writes so well about personal finance, and yet the only lesson you get to learn watching is:

Don't shop. Ever.

Okay, maybe getting specific about credit cards would make the movie quite heavy, but hey! You have to dress and you have to shop. It's about doing it wisely and finding balance, not shooting yourself in the leg!

Whatever. I want that dress.