Rose (Amy Adams) is a single parent raising her seven-year-old son Oscar (Jason Spevack) in Albuquerque while working as a maid. Things have not panned out as expected for this former cheerleader who was the most popular girl in high school. She is having an affair with Mac (Steve Zahn), a married cop who was the love of her life as the star high school football player. He is the one who tips her off about a new job which pays very well: crime scene cleanup. Rose needs the money since she pulled her son out of school when the principal suggests that Oscar needs to be put on drugs to calm him down. She wants to enroll him in a private school.

Rose's slacker sister Norah (Emily Blunt) lives at home with their father Joe Norkowski (Alan Arkin), a restless retiree who is always on the lookout for new business opportunities. Rose asks Norah to join her in setting up a crime scene business. Winston (Clifton Collins, Jr.), a cleaning supplies store clerk, proves to be very helpful. The two sisters buy a van and find themselves cleaning up in places where people have been shot or found dead in their apartments. Rose plunges into the work without batting an eyebrow whereas Norah finds it hard to take. They put an ad in the paper and seem to be on their way to the goal of having insurance companies recommend them.

Christine Jeffs (Rain) directs this character-driven dramedy and is fortunate to have three incredibly gifted actors in the lead roles. Adams again proves her versatility as Rose, a pretty woman who yearns for the glory days of yesteryear and still has a startling lack of self-esteem. At one point, she is compelled to go to a party attended by women from her high school class so she can brag about her new job. Of course, these suburbanites are shocked when they hear what she does.

If Rose feels bad about herself, her sister Norah is even more screwed up. Emily Blunt does a remarkable job conveying this stoner character's yearning to connect with the mother she never knew. She also proves to be convincing in her strange relationship with an older woman (Mary Lynn Rajskub), especially when she takes her "trestling" (standing under a train trestle as it roars over your head sending vibrations through your body). And then there is Alan Arkin's winning performance as Joe whose idiosyncracies are bearable when he comes through at the end of the drama as a father who knows best.

Special features on the DVD include an audio commentary featuring writer Megan Holley and producer Glenn Williamson and "A Fresh Look at a Dirty Business."


Films about Sisters