The Devil Wears Prada
I actually watched this movie for the first time a few weeks ago, but hadn't gotten the chance to put my thoughts down about it yet.
I was...deeply disturbed by this movie..in the simple sense that the story was very well done and the theme about changing one's priorities for a temporary job, really affected me. Not because it was poorly done, and not because I disagreed with anything the movie depicted, but I think I probably felt what the writers intended the audience to feel.
The title was pretty apt, in the sense that Meryl Streep's character ("Miranda") was probably the coldest, most emotionally empty and callous character I've ever seen in a film. She did a masterful job. She played a woman who was completely devoid of compassion or empathy, to the point where it actually sort of chilled me to the bone while I was engrossed in the movie.
The premise was simple enough: a post-college student (Hathaway) who ultimately wanted to be a journalist, decided to take this clerical position at a high-profile fashion magazine in order to make ends meet and gain some generic professional experience. She complains about her boss (Streep) to her boyfriend repeatedly and mocks the position, telling herself that "it's only for a year or two". However, when she finally hits a low point at her job a few weeks into it, an older male coworker tells her bluntly, "You're treated badly because you choose to treat your job badly. When you start putting some effort into it, maybe our boss won't be as big of a bitch to you." [okay, I'm paraphrasing]
You'd think the storyline would take a positive turn at this point, but, alas...it was at this point in the movie when the main character became SO focused on the position, and on meeting her boss' approval, that she started to slowly ignore her own conscience, and let important things in her life drift away when they didn't quite mesh with her evolving persona.
Here is the part that really left me disturbed; she basically gave up her identity, and her sense of ethics, in order to meet *one woman's approval*, one who ultimately would not matter in the grand scheme of things and who actually cared not one iota for her employees whatsoever. The movie demonstrated a systematic dissolving of Anne Hathaway's character's belief system, which culminated, predictably, in one drunken night in Paris where she cheats on her boyfriend and best friend with a pressuring douchebag from the fashion industry. Talk about hitting rock bottom.
The character has a personal epiphany when the soulless creature that is Miranda soon thereafter says, proudly, "You're just like me. And everyone wants to be US." it is at this point that Hathaway is horrified and realizes how low she has sunk, and quits the job soon thereafter.
Different people probably take different things from this movie. Some people probably see it as a "chick flick", as it deals with somewhat catty women in the fashion industry. Others might view it as an interesting romantic drama. For me, I was unsettled to watch a movie about a young person letting themselves be treated like something worse than dirt, and then essentially beg for more. She let herself be manipulated by not only her boss, but her coworkers, into believing that Miranda's beliefs were basically the only ones that mattered in the entire universe. Streep repeatedly calls Hathaway "fat", for example, when her character is a size 6. Yet, instead of giving her the finger and quitting which any sane person would do, she becomes weepy and decides to start dieting.
$#%^@%#$#
Anyway, this became more long-winded than I had intended. In summary: It isn't typically my favorite genre of movie, but I was impressed and very surprised with how much the movie gave me food for thought. It also made me thankful that I have a job for which I never have to sacrifice my personal integrity or ethics.