SPOILERS HEREIN

I may have subconsciously done this on purpose: following Manderlay with Shopgirl turned out to be a great way of ending the year. They worked on me almost the same way as following Dogville with Pieces of April did in 2003. Von Trier’s film ends with such hatred, and this one with such love, it actually made me sigh like those girls do in those movies, lol.

I think mostly it took my breath away because the movie opens with such promise – a kooky relationship beginning between Claire Danes and Jason Schwartzman, kinda like May without all the murdering and what-not, and then it appears it might get even better when Steve Martin appears, but then Danes and Schwartzman are apart the whole movie. I really thought they weren’t going to get together, and it seemed so right for them to, but of course, finally, all works out. The kiss at the end, “I’ll protect you,” like I said, I actually honest to god sighed.

This movie doesn’t have cracking lines like Bowfinger’s “Do you like Smashing Pumpkins?” “I LOVE to do that!” or L.A. Story’s “It’s a damn nuisance, it’s my testicles,” but Steve Martin’s style is all over it. In another dimension, I guess, it could even have been called L.A. Story. Barrington Pheloung’s score is wonderful, too.

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 31st, 2005 at 3:50 am in 4 hearts, Movie Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.