Little Miss Sunshine

It was a real toss up today. Little Miss Sunshine or The Illusionist? I had heard the good word of mouth about Little Miss Sunshine and had a friend recommend it (Thanks, CG). But The Illusionist is getting some rave reviews, so I'd really like to check that out another day.

Anyhoo, this film opened at the Sundance Film Festival and recently opened in wide release. I love Steve Carell and had heard that this was funny. This isn't anything like his work in The 40 Year Old Virgin, however and it won't be your cup of tea if you like the prototypical cookie cutter slapstick/gross out humour movies. This is a smart, dark indie comedy. Steve Carell is also not the star of this film as it is truly an ensemble cast also starring Greg Kinnear, Toni Collette (who I love), Alan Arkin (who is great in everything he does), Paul Dano and Abigail Breslin.

It is about a dysfunctional family who goes on a road trip so that Olive (Breslin) can compete in the Little Miss Sunshine pageant. Her dad, Richard (Kinnear) is a fumbling motivational speaker who aspires to get his 9 step program to make him rich and famous. Her mother, Sheryl (Collette), is barely keeping it together stressing about money problems and trying to keep the peace. Olive is also being coached by her Grandpa (Arkin), a cocaine addicted senior, booted out of his retirement home for his drug use and now lives with the family. Olive's older brother, Dwayne (Dano), has taken a vow of silence until he reaches his goal of becoming an Air Force jet pilot and only communicates using a notepad and a Sharpie. He's 15, into Neitzsche and spends much of the film in a Jesus Was Wrong T-shirt. Sheryl's brother Frank (Carell) has recently attempted suicide and is staying with the family under orders of his doctor. He is a down on his luck Proust scholar heartbroken over a man he lost to his academic rival. In short, they are all losers trying in some way to be winners. Winning seems to be a recurring theme throughout. Richard prattles and preaches to everybody about what a "winner" really is, while Frank rolls his eyes at him.


To be honest, I wasn't pulled in right away. In a weird way, the characters grow and entrance you until you are with them and rooting for them in the end, even Richard, who is a strangely likeable unlikeable guy. As with any 'journey' movie, transformation occurs for everybody. I don't want to delve into that too much, so I don't ruin anything for anybody. Part of the coolness of this movie is slowly being sucked in and anticipating the next event for the family. You really do want to find out what happens to them because you care. One of the most touching things in this movie is when Richard and Dwayne escape from the craziness to quietly talk on the pier. Dwayne talks about wanting to sleep until he's 18 so he misses high school. Frank starts telling Dwayne about the life of Proust. How he writes a book nobody reads and is near the end of his life, broke and homosexual with many unrequited love affairs. He says that Proust realizes that the best years of his life are the ones that he suffered, because that is when he really lived and learned the most. Or something. Frank says, "So if you go to sleep until you're 18, think of all the suffering you're gonna miss. High school is your prime suffering years. You don't get better suffering than that!" It was very touching without being too cornball. I won't give away the end, but I haven't laughed that hard in a theater in a long time. What is really scary, however, is that the girls who played the parts of the other young Little Miss Sunshine contestants are all actual veteran beauty pageant contestants. If you watch the movie, you'll get what I mean. I love how the directors (Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris) make a statement against those pageants without being too hokey or heavy handed. Michael Arndt writes a great script.

Little Miss Sunshine
8/10
Highly Recommended
See it because.... you love a great smart, dark comedy, you like a great story, to see a great ensemble cast kicking ass, or you like indie films.
Best line: Dwayne: "Do what you love and fuck the rest!"

More ramblings to come....