Shopgirl offers a new twist on the classic young poor woman/middle-aged rich man love story. Despite the familiar plot, the movie is not unoriginal and at times offers a comforting departure from the modern love story. With the guide of screenwriter and original novelist Steve Martin (Cheaper by the Dozen), the plot shows the odd sequence of events that love sometimes takes and provides viewers with a likeable protagonist that you root for from beginning to end. However, it does this with about a half hour of too much footage. Shopgirl starts out as a great movie, but drags on for much too long.

Shopgirl begins as a romantic comedy about two awkward, unsuccessful twenty-something's. The protagonist Mirabelle Buttersfield (played by Stage Beauty'sClaire Danes) is a young artist who works in the Glove Department at Saks Fifth Avenue in Los Angeles. In debt, unsuccessful, and lonely, Mirabelle meets Jeremy (I Heart Huckabees' Jason Schwartzman) at the Laundromat. Claire Danes does an excellent job of playing the quirky young woman who is tardily coming of age. Jeremy, her original love interest, provides comic relief with his awkward yet charming advances toward Mirabelle. If the movie continued on this path, it would have been a great and original romantic comedy about realistic characters getting over their awkwardness and falling in love.

However, the movie changes drastically once Martin's character Ray Porter is introduced. The comic relief/love interest Jeremy is relegated to a side character; his story is told in brief scenes stuck in between the main events. Ray meets Mirabelle at Saks and is immediately taken with her. He provides her with gifts and Mirabelle slowly changes from a quirky, awkward girl into a beautiful, stylish woman. True to the younger woman-older man formula, she falls in love with him and is delighted by romantic evenings and extravagant gifts.

Martin's performance as the suave, handsome lover is a surprising success. Although the sudden intensity of their relationship comes off as foreshadowing for a crazy love obsession rather than an enchanting romance, Martin's ability as a screenwriter is more responsible for that than his acting. The comedian by trade does an excellent job of playing a very natural and passionate role.

Ray and Mirabelle's relationship comprises the greatest portion of the movie. However, the relationship is not interesting enough to be worthy of such a large amount of time. Martin's character is supposed to sweep Dane's off her feet, but the sudden change from a quirky romantic comedy to an intense love story makes their relationship creepy rather than romantic. The dialogue becomes scarce and is replaced by an overwhelming love theme, complete with a soundtrack of luxurious melody and strings. I longed for the funny scenes from the beginning of the movie and grew bored of the intense eye gazing that abruptly encompassed the movie. The movie begins as funny with a moderate pace, and then slows down to the point of immobility by the middle.

The plot continues to take twists as Mirabelle's character grows in interesting ways. The pace picks up towards the end of the movie, and some of the humor that was lost earlier returns.

Shopgirl is not a bad movie; in fact, it has a lot of great characteristics. The dialogue is very natural, the cinematography is beautiful, and, although incessant at times, the soundtrack always evokes the proper emotions for each scene. If it were only twenty minutes shorter and didn't suddenly change genres, it would be one of the best romance movies made in a long time. Unfortunately, the once original romantic comedy turns into a boring love story, making it a movie that I am hesitant to recommend seeing in theaters, but feel comfortable recommending to rent for a rainy Friday night.

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