Review of Sunshine Cleaning (2008) by Dawdlingpoet — 22 Nov 2021

I enjoyed this movie, its quite dark of course but there is a lighter, more optimistic side to it I think. The story is one I've never seen before, its a pretty original movie, which can be a rarity to find these days I believe, so I quite enjoyed it. The characters are quite interesting and as the movie continues, we learn about what connects them to the crime scenes they clean, or more 'sanitise' and I did feel quite an attachment to them, especially to Rose, who has a young son (who turns eight in the movie) called Oscar, who is quite an endearing character. Rose has to raise funds to be able to afford to send Oscar to a special needs school and this is partly what causes her to decide to launch the cleaning business. Oscar is, quite typically as a kid, quite naive and I think that naivety is also quite present in his mum and her sister. It was nice to see Alan Arkin playing Oscars grandfather, Joe, I enjoyed the scenes featuring the two of them and how Joe would make Oscar feel better about himself and so on. There are some quite touching scenes in the movie, such as when Oscar is playing about with the two way radio in the newly bought old rust-bucket VW-Beetle-esque van that they use for the business. He recalls the car salesman kidding that the radio broadcasts up to heaven, so he's seen when his parents are busy elsewhere, posing questions and waiting to see if he'll get a response. There's another scene where Rose takes her self appointed new friend, Lynn (played by Mary Lynn Rajskub, known for playing Chloe in the TV drama show 24), and shows her how to get up to a ledge underneath train tracks when a train is arriving and she gets a rush from holding her hand up between the tracks then quickly pulling it away again. Another theme in the movie is that of acceptance, of course not everyone is over the moon to hear about what line of business their line, the biohazard cleanup business isn't the most glamorous business around but after completing a few jobs, the sisters feel that they get some sense of accomplishment from it, which they try to explain. I guess it goes to show that if you like what you do then thats all that matters. I think most people can relate to having people look down on you somewhat if your not what they'd think of as being successful.

Of course there are a few bleak and mild to moderately graphic scenes but I don't feel that overall the movie is without a fair dose of optimism. There is humour in it too but its quite light, you might guess that a movie about a pair of sisters cleaning up actual murder and suicide crime scenes isn't likely fodder for strong belly laughs and you'd be right but there is something amusing about how naive they are at first and the things they do before they learn how such jobs are supposed to be done. I think that the sisters are quite vulnerable as characters and they rely on each other and the guy who runs the local cleaning store, Winston, who finds it quite amusing to see how they announce their arrival to the business and how clearly naive they are about how to get started at first, to keep them right. These women aren't really the sort of people you'd perhaps expect to see cleaning up such scenes/places, yet as I've already hinted at, the reason why they chose to get into such an industry becomes more clear as the different crime scenes trigger flash backs that help the viewer to understand it a bit better.

I thought that this was a good movie which wasn't as dark as I had perhaps thought it might be. However, its not unrealistically bright and breezy as such either I suppose.

Yes, I'd recommend this film. I thought this was an interesting movie, it features a story I haven't really seen before and the cast did a good job portraying their characters well. The movie is somewhat bleak and sad but there is some optimism too. Its amusing in its own way too at points but I most liked the character portrayal because I ended up really wanting to see the sisters do well and to have a succssful business. Its an interesting movie that I would recommend to anyone curious about it.