SUNSHINE CLEANING boasts the same creative team that brought us the 2006 LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE, a picture that surprised many by nabbing a BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY OSCAR the same year. And it's no doubt that little statue paved the way for a not too distant follow up picture in SUNSHINE CLEANING. The cast has received an upgrade in AMY ADAMS (OSCAR nod for DOUBT, unforgettable in ENCHANTED) and EMILY BLUNT (fantastic in DEVIL WEARS PRADA), as well as a more human ALAN ARKIN. As it would turn out though, the cast was one of the only gleaming parts of CLEANING.
ADAMS plays ROSE, an inspired but challenged single mother who opens the film employed as a maid in a local cleaning service. Her sister, NORAH (played by BLUNT) is cut from the same young and spunk sister mold you'd find anywhere. NORAH is rebellious, unreliable, sexually confused (or at least successful in confusing others) and played well by BLUNT. ARKIN plays their father, JOE, who feels like a more believable version of his role in LITTLE MISS. Perhaps the best performance came from CLIFTON COLLINS JR, who plays an endearing supplies store manager that befriends ROSE. STEVE ZAHN (MACK) sporadically shows up as ROSE'S illicit love interest but is sadly forgettable.
Adding to ROSE'S growing list of complications is that her son OSCAR (played poorly but not by his own fault by JASON SPEVACK) is being kicked out of public school for erratic behavior (some of which is encouraged by his "hip" AUNT NORAH) and ROSE must come up with the money to send him to private school. The answer? ROSE'S own crime-scene cleanup company, SUNSHINE CLEANING.
The most noticeable weakness in CLEANING is the screenplay, helmed by newcomer MEGAN HOLLEY . It isn't that the characters aren't believable - in fact the population of this some-where place NEW MEXICO town comes to life brilliantly in moments - it's that there is no consistency from scene to scene. Not unlike first-timers, I imagine HOLLEY was desperate to keep certain lines and interactions in tact, regardless of how flat they fell on screen. No clearer an example of this is when a scene has the audience captured, in this case AUNT NORAH telling OSCAR a scary bedtime story, only to linger a few beats too many until the writing runs stale, the comedic timing is lost and the performances redundant.
Speaking of OSCAR, by the end of the film I couldn't avoid seeing the character as anything more than a device. As if ROSE needed another challenge on top of being broke, battling depression and persisting an affair with MACK, OSCAR seems like too much icing on the cake. Not only is ROSE interesting without OSCAR, the additional layer of ROSE as a single mother seemed like an under-developed story-line, tossed in the backseat and only accessible when she needed to be pushed back down into the dirt.
CLEANING could benefit most from an uncompromising editor. Too many scenes either last too long or were completely unnecessary. What jokes worked were undone by sloppy transitioning. A pace would be established and then suddenly abandoned and just when things seem interesting we're either yanked away or the film ends (literally). And while CLEANING showcased ADAMS and BLUNT'S dramatic capabilities, ten minutes less tears could have gone a long way.
It's not as though I wanted to dislike CLEANING (quite the opposite for those who read my preview), it just seemed unavoidable (and wasn't helped by a gross misuse of slow motion to open the film). In many ways, CLEANING was too epically dramatic for its own good. The quirkiness of JOE or WINSTON and the struggle of ROSE and NORAH were lost as the film developed and by the time it had wrapped I was almost (gasp) relieved. If anything, CLEANING will fuel the fire of studio executives hesitant to hand over a picture to first time writers and first time directors. As desperately as CLEANING refused to play by the rules of cliche, there are reasons why these rules are in place. They keep pictures honest, audiences happy and resumes impressive.
