Fisher, Dunst, and Caplan in "Bachelorette"

Bachelorette’s mere existence is a success story, regardless of the film’s quality. Leslye Headland adapted her Off Broadway play—about a trio of women and their ambivalence about and debauchery during the wedding of a loathed frenemy—for the screen and got a few high-wattage stars on board; the movie, first released online rather than gradually in limited release, has already hit number one on the iTunes rental platform. (It comes out in theaters here September 7.)

And Bachelorette, with its alienation of the audience—this film depicts its characters behaving very, very badly toward one another—is a tough sell. But it justifies its existence, if barely. It’s quite possible that this film owes much to the success of last year’s wedding blockbuster Bridesmaids, but the two could not be more divergent. It may have taken a zeitgeist-y, sexy pitch to get this movie onto the hard drives of iTunes users, but so be it: it’s among the edgiest and most daring American comedies in years, if one that occasionally tips too far into miserabilism.

Kirsten Dunst, who’s made a dandy second career in small and daring roles and who ought never to go back to dumb studio fare, plays the near-protagonist, Regan, the maid of honor. Regan begins the film bragging to Becky (Rebel Wilson) about how she’s been working with young cancer victims, beaming the whole while—this is a completely competent woman, we’re meant to learn, with a heart of obsidian. (They’re getting lunch, and Regan orders a Cobb salad with all the elements of a Cobb salad on the side, pushing the joke into the realm of the obvious, as often happens in this movie.) Becky, the one completely good-hearted member of the ensemble, announces her engagement, which prompts a remarkable comic flicker of revulsion across Regan’s face, before cutting to a three-way call (still?) between Regan and the other two bridesmaids, the trio the story will choose to follow.

The rest of the film takes place on the night before Becky’s wedding, as Katie (Isla Fisher) and Gena (a remarkable Lizzy Caplan) join Regan for a bachelorette party that quickly devolves to include only the three of them. The cocaine comes not in bags but, it would seem, in buckets; that the three girls would end up trying on Becky’s oversized wedding dress (which fits two of the slender bridesmaids), tearing it open in the process, only makes sense here.

Little in the following minutes makes perfect sense, though, and the film has the theatrical-adaptation curse of sticking to a very strict through-line at the expense of spontaneity or realism. Why must our three bachelorettes crash the groom’s bachelor party? Onstage, it’s to create more drama in a limited space, to move on to the next scene. On film, weird and unconvincing explanations are thrust at the viewer, but, frankly, it doesn’t matter: Ms. Dunst and Ms. Caplan carry their characters so well that the audience is willing to go down avenues that otherwise seem inexplicable.

Ms. Dunst is utterly fantastic—after a wildly different performance as a depressive bride in Melancholia—playing a maid of honor sublimating her anger and belief that she cannot be loved. She elevates the film past any memory of the more traditional wedding movies of the past—the horrific Bride Wars and The Wedding Planner, or even the superlative but very sunny Bridesmaids—by creating a character who feels drawn from life, even in all her rage. Ms. Caplan’s character comes less from life and more from filmic cliché: she’s the burnout friend who sleeps with one too many unsuitable men out of a nihilistic impulse emerging from the screenwriter’s chic boredom. But Ms. Caplan’s sheer charisma moves the part out of the realm of the sad best friend. The same cannot be said of Isla Fisher’s performance, though. Her role as an irresponsible dumb-bunny is the thinnest in the movie, and her work in the film has not even a hint of intelligence behind the eyes. I’m fairly certain she mispronounced the name of her workplace, “Club Monaco.” And if it was a joke, it was too nasty to land.

In any case, Ms. Dunst and Ms. Caplan power through the middle part of the movie, a section of sheer contrivance, to arrive, suddenly, at a bravura finale. Perhaps their unjustified detour to a strip club mirrors a bad night spent drunk and high; nothing is meant to make sense, really. Once the three sober up and begin to deal with all the previous night’s damages (that dress is still torn apart), the movie suddenly comes together as more than just a pair of good performances and some classy zingers. There’s genuine tension inherent in the struggle to get Becky’s dress fixed on time.

And that tension wouldn’t exist if the movie were in fact what it proclaims itself to be, from its opening credits of the protagonists’ yearbook photos with slurs scrawled across them to the bridesmaids’ calling the bride “Pig Face” to all those drugs and all that vomit: the bachelorettes are neurotic not because they’re angry messes, as they keep declaring, but because they love Becky and they’re scared for their own futures, all at once. If they can’t get the dress to her on time, what hope is there for them? It’s a question fraught with annoying prejudices—being a bride, or a good bridesmaid, is not at the center of being a woman, as women are told by popular culture—that are nevertheless key to American women’s lives.

By its end, the messy Bachelorette isn’t just a good counterbalance to all those bad wedding movies—or the good one that ends with a Wilson Phillips sing-along. It’s a way for any truly flawed viewer (which is to say any viewer, or at least any New York viewer) to stand vicariously at the center of a nasty, but honestly nasty, set of nuptials.

Bachelorette

Running Time 91 Minutes

Written and Directed by Leslye Headland

Starring Kirsten Dunst, Isla Fisher and Lizzy Caplan

Three out of four stars

Leonardo DiCaprio (Gatsby), Vanity Fair, December 2012

Headline: "YES, LEO'S BACK! Hollywood's Ultimate Bad Boy Goes Back to the Roaring Twenties--and Aims At Oscar"

Editorial Concept: Leo plays with a baby tiger cub, smokes a cigar by a pool, walks through a hedge maze.

Carey Mulligan (Daisy), Vogue, November 2012

Headline: "SECRETS OF EAST EGG: Carey Mulligan as the Woman Who Stole Gatsby's Heart"

Editorial Concept: Done entirely in character, with special attention to the scene with all Gatsby's shirts on the floor.

Tobey Maguire (Nick Carraway), Esquire, November 2012

Headline: "THE TAO OF TOBEY: Hollywood's Hottest Recluse on Fitzgerald, Film, Finding Contentment--and What He's Learned Along the Way"

Editorial Concept: Looking stern on a golf course.

Joel Edgerton (Tom Buchanan), GQ, October 2012

Headline: "TIE ONE ON! The 12 Neckties You Need Now"

Editorial Concept: Mr. Edgerton models a bunch of ties.

Isla Fisher (Myrtle Wilson), Allure, January 2013

Headline: "IT'S ISLA! Mrs. Borat (That's Right!) On Her Big New Role"

Editorial Concept: Best mascaras for your hair color.

As the Hollywood box office machine chugs along (in case you were wondering, Paul Blart will hit $100 million dollars this weekend; expect the rain of frogs to follow shortly thereafter), we've found ourselves concentrating on larger issues besides film revenue. Like: is anyone actually buying this Joaquin Phoenix thing? His whole "I'm-retiring-from-acting-to-become-a-rap-star-and-Casey-Affleck-is-going-to-film-it" shtick has already been pretty much debunked. And, more importantly, with the exception of his Fleet Foxes-like beard, did any of his behavior during the now infamous interview with David Letterman truly seem that out of the ordinary? This is Joaquin Phoenix we're talking about! The dude has made his career out of playing soft-spoken, mumbling drifters with issues. He gets to play another variation on one of those characters in this week's Two Lovers, but if you're all Joaquined out, don't fret! Four other movies hit theaters over this dual holiday weekend (it's President's Day, too). Here's a handy guide to the releases.

Friday the 13th

What's the story: Seriously? Another one? If you've been in a coma for the last 29 years and are just coming out of it, we'll fill you in: Jason Voorhees stomps around Camp Crystal Lake wearing a hockey mask and killing sex-crazed teenagers with a giant machete. Cue the credits. Directed by Marcus Nispel (the man who brought us the despicable Texas Chainsaw Massacre reboot), Friday the 13th apparently culls plot points and killings from the first four films in the franchise. Oh what fun! Expect this to make bags of money.

Who should see it: Freddy Krueger.

The International

What's the story: If The International has one thing in its favor, it's the villain: a large international bank that deals in deception, murder, arms dealing and predatory lending. Well, maybe not that last one. Clive Owen and Naomi Watts star, and as much as we love them both, we're more interested in seeing Mr. Owen battle wits with Julia Roberts in the superior-looking Duplicity next month. Tom Tykwer directs, further moving himself into one-hit wonder territory. Do you realize Run Lola Run was released over 10 years ago?

Who should see it: James Gorman, co-president of Morgan Stanley.

Gomorrah

What's the story: Matteo Garrone's Gomorrah was supposed to be one of the sure-fire nominees for Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars. Whoops! Let's add another movie to the list of snubs. Martin Scorsese helps bring this violent polemic about the modern-day Mafia in Italy to America, but don't get too upset if you miss Gomorrah in theaters. IFC Films will add it to their On Demand roster in the coming weeks.

Who should see it: Young Vito Corleone.

Confessions of a Shopaholic

What's the story: In this new documentary, a young woman runs up mountains of credit card debt and is chased down by debt collectors. Oh wait, scratch that. Confessions of a Shopaholic is actually a romantic comedy based on the best selling books by Sophie Kinsella and starring Isla Fisher and Hugh Dancy. As much as we love Ms. Fisher (hooray for Definitely, Maybe and Wedding Crashers!), she still feels like the actress you cast when Amy Adams is unavailable. Meanwhile, the timing of this movie couldn't be worse—a relic of a not-so-distant past when the Dow Jones Industrial Average was over 14,000 and people spent money like drunken sailors. Not even super producer Jerry Bruckheimer and the presence of Rihanna's "Disturbia" in the trailer can save this movie from collapsing like the economy.

Who should see it: Members of the National Foundation of Credit Counseling.

P. J. Hogan’s Confessions of a Shopaholic, from a screenplay by Tracey Jackson, Tim Firth and Kayla Alpert, is based on the books Confessions of a Shopaholic and Shopaholic Takes Manhattan by Sophie Kinsella. Ms. Kinsella has written five Shopaholic books, all best sellers in both the United Kingdom, from which they originated, and the United States, where they were equally embraced. The only problem is that Confessions of a Shopaholic is arriving in theaters at a time in our history when enormous credit card debt has become a global problem, and the cutesy venial sin of the heroine of the Shopaholic novels and this film seems irrelevant and possibly toxic. 

Even so, I was somewhat amused by the antics of Isla Fisher’s magazine writer Rebecca Bloomwood as she maxes out all her credit cards in her uncontrollable mania for shoes, clothes and accessories from the most expensive department stores. It is an addiction that began in childhood, and I wish I knew the name of the devastatingly talented tot who played Rebecca Bloomwood as a shopaholic in the making, so I could praise her in print.

Not that the Australia-raised Ms. Fisher is anything less than sparklingly bubbly in her farcical flamboyance. But then I don’t know where we’d be movie-wise if there had never been an Australia to serve as a training ground for wild talent. Speaking of which, producer Jerry Bruckheimer selected Australia-born, U.S.-based P. J. Hogan to direct Confessions of a Shopaholic: “P.J.’s work has the kind of deft light touch that we wanted for the movie. Both Muriel’s Wedding (1994) and My Best Friend’s Wedding (1997) were two pictures that I loved watching. He has such a wonderful sense of humor and a delightful romantic touch.”

As for the timeliness or untimeliness of the production, executive producer Mike Stenson struck a positive pose: “If you look at the debt crisis going on in the U.S. right now with everyone having 27 credit cards, everybody can relate to Rebecca Bloomwood.”

Well, perhaps not quite everybody. The box office will have the final say. In the meantime, we critics have to decide how worshipful we should be toward this flaunting of high fashion while pretending to ridicule it. It’s the old Hollywood game of having all your luxury goods, and pretending that they don’t bring happiness without true love.

That sacred duty is assigned to Hugh Dancy’s Luke Brandon, a Brit workaholic magazine editor who is taught to relax in a warmer climate by the irrepressible shopaholic herself. If I understand our president correctly, workaholics are more needed now than shopaholics. But let’s be fair. Not too long ago, it was the duty of American consumers to shop until they dropped, and no one warned them of the dire consequences to follow their splurges of extravagance.

Still, it is indicative of the film’s bad faith that its closest approximation of a villain is Robert Stanton’s Derek Smeath, an intrusive bill collector for the credit card companies, which have been stiffed by Rebecca to pay for her shopping sprees. How dare he try to clip our heroine’s wings!

Smeath’s feminine counterpart is Leslie Bibb’s magazine staffer Alicia Billington, a fairly gorgeous creature herself. Of course, middle-class Rebecca would never have possessed the fancy address on her résumé if it were not for the generosity of her upscale girlfriend-landlord, Krysten Ritter’s Suze Cleath-Stuart.

John Goodman and Joan Cusack supply sentiment and eccentricity as Rebecca’s down-to-earth parents, and Kristin Scott Thomas is wasted in a laboriously written role as French fashion designer Alette Naylor. John Lithgow contributes his air of authority as the magazine magnate who helps the romantic leads stay afloat.

It is not surprising that the hullabaloo raised by meetings of Shopaholic Anonymous does little to discourage the religion of upscale shopping. Actually, the funniest gags are inspired by Rebecca’s addiction. My favorite occurs when her line of sight includes both a good-looking male passerby and a scrumptious display window.

The passerby smiles expectantly at the ecstatic expression on Rebecca’s face until he realizes that she is reacting only to the department store window. Ms. Fisher brings the gags off with the perfect timing that has been her hallmark in popular comedies such as Wedding Crashers (2005) and Definitely, Maybe (2008). Nonetheless, I can’t really recommend this movie in these perilous times, except for viewers in search of a nostalgic chuckle or two.

asarris@observer.com