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By Dawn Januszkewicz

ur journey begins with Ann Hathaway as Andy eating breakfast, in the non-materialistic, anti-conformity, first-year post-collegiate, humble (poor) apartment. She heads off to the twilight zone for an interview, lands an assistant job that glamour girls would die for, and is perpetuated into a world of unconditional dedication that pays in accessories.

We then witness beautiful, shallow women dive and jump by the whim of the work-a-holic Miranda Priestly as played by Meryl Streep. Priestly's employees buy into her status pressure world of aesthetics. A neurotic labyrinth has these rats chasing cheese they cannot eat, around walls that all eventually lead to a locked and gated exit.

Streep plays Priestly as a true business women who never loses control or degrades herself with emotional displays or reactions. She expresses only disgust or frustration by reducing others with a constant stream of demands and insults.

Andy initially finds discontent with Priestly's treatment and upon consulting Priestly's only and long-time friend, she discovers her failure steams from taking her assistant, coffee running job for granted. To rectify the situation she gets a makeover, changes her look and loses weight to attain a gaunt, haunted look at size four. She becomes high fashion and accepts her job getting coffee and designer scarves with pride, because she handles pressure with style and she needs to be great - the best at what she does. And boy does she fetch coffee with prestige!

As motivating as this story is to establish a strong work ethic and do the best you can, it fails to provide a safety net of common sense and boundaries; it doesn't even recognize the fine line it lunges over.

During this transformation, we witness a strong relationship dissolve through neglect, a hollow affair culminate in a hangover and disappointment, and close friends become shadows. All is sacrificed for Andy's relationship with her boss, as misguided and ill-conceived as it is, which turns out to be as shallow as her first impression of Priestly as "the dragon lady."

Casting Hathaway as Andy was an interesting choice that really made this movie a choice for tweens and teenagers, but also created a threshold of irony. Andy's sweet face and convincing innocence and intellectual drive are offset by the shallow and hollow pursuit of high fashion. The makeover routine was a touch redundant being that we've already witnessed the astounding difference between the diamond in the rough and the diamond in the Tiffany's display case as seen in Princess Diaries.

Meryl Streep was, again, genius. Not typically chosen for these type of movies, Streep portrays Priestly with more style and maniacal tension than anyone else. After witnessing her performance it is obvious that only a dramatic actor with established skills could play a layered role such as Priestly with such tact and casual detachment.

Ultimately we watch an impressionable girl disregard her values to do the best she can at a job that doesn't improve her resume or skills, let alone warrant respect. She loses her boyfriend, friends, apartment, and temporarily loses sight of herself.

In the end, she leaves the job with new perspective (that a journalism major would have established prior to a gopher job) and a nifty pair of boots. In the long run the "perspective" she attains is nothing more than a enthusiasm for all that she has lost. If the direction of this film were slightly adjusted it would be a brilliant serious drama instead of a friendly family film.

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