Little Miss Sunshine

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Correction: A film review on Wednesday about "Little Miss Sunshine" referred incorrectly to contestants in the fictional children's beauty pageant of the title. The critic intended to compare the contestants to underage prostitutes, not to "underage fleshpots."
The New York Times, 31 July 2006

A lot of people are going to love Little Miss Sunshine. It's a little movie with a lot of big laughs, and it packs the kind of cynical sentiment that passes for 'edge'. On top of that it's got the latest comedy 'It' Man, Steve Carell, as a suicidal gay Proust scholar, the sort of miraculous casting coup all indie filmmakers dream about (Carell signed before The 40 Year Old Virgin became box office gold).

A sitcom on wheels, it's a contrived story about a highly dysfunctional (but recognizably middle class) family who drive 700 miles together in a banana yellow VW Van to get seven-year-old Olive (Abigail Breslin) to her beauty contest in Redondo Beach on time.

Richard Hoover (Greg Kinnear) is a motivational speaker who is expecting to get a publisher any day now for his labour of love self-help book. His long suffering wife Sheryl (Toni Collette) does her best to keep the brood in tow, but it's not easy: teenager Dwayne (Paul Dano) has taken a vow of silence until he fulfills his dream of becoming a jet pilot; Grandpa (Alan Arkin) has a smack habit; and then there's her brother Frank (Carell) who is released into her care after trying to slash his wrists when his lover left him for his biggest rival.

There's a lot of Clark Griswold in Richard (that's Chevy Chase in the National Lampoon's Vacation saga, for the initiated). His optimism and can-do determination that everyone has a good time drives the whole family crazy. As the trip gets grisly, his desperation comes to the surface; but of course everyone else on the bus shares this very American affliction: the pursuit of happiness is always just around the next corner.

Actually I've always harboured a soft spot for the much maligned National Lampoon movies, so I'm hard-pressed to explain what it is about critically fawned on Little Miss Sunshine that rubs me up the wrong way. As my wife keeps telling me, it is funny. (For a while anyway.)

Probably encountering the film at last year's Sundance Film Festival didn't help. It's a politicized atmosphere, and this is about as mainstream a movie as 'Indie' gets - granted that producer Marc Turteltaub paid for it himself when Focus Features dropped out. Though I would say I went in with an open mind, the hype was already frenzied after the first screening supposedly had them rolling in the aisles.

I giggled along fairly happily (if uneasily) at the obvious jokes about insufferably priggish Richard, reactionary old grandpa and Frank's sexual proclivities, and chortled on cue as the VW broke down and push came to shove.

'No one gets left behind!' cries Frank, realizing too late that Olive isn't on board anymore. But around the time - well, I don't want to give anything important away here - but around the time that one of the characters bids adieu the movie left me by the roadside. I couldn't believe in these people anymore, and the laughs just died on me.

There's something more than a little smug and condescending about the grandstand climax too - which manages to have its cake and eat it by reveling in the vulgarity it pretends to be satirizing. The film's paradoxical bright spot is Steve Carell, whose sullen morosity is a deadpan rebuff to the filmmakers' over-weening sense of superiority. In fact the first rate cast gives the picture more depth than it deserves. But in the end it's another dysfunctional family comedy that insists on ironing everything out - when anyone actually in a family knows those creases are there for good.

Even though I would make this a contender for the most over-rated movie of 2006, I have to admit I'm likely to be in a minority on this one. Maybe it really is much fresher and funnier than I think it is, and even if it isn't, it's got crowd-pleaser written all over it.

Tom Charity

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Critics' Reviews

Time Out

For a movie generated from the Amerindie algorithm of family dysfunction, road-trip catharsis and studied quirk, this... read more on www.timeout.com

Sunday Times

Once in a while, a film turns up that has something really special. Little Miss Sunshine is exactly that

The Sun

Hilarious, straight from the heart and totally unmissable

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Fantastic feel-good film

Michaela Hamilton from Co. Durham , 11/09/2006

What an amazing film! The story centres around an unconventional family and their young daughter Olive's entry into the final of a national beauty pageant. The film tracks their 700 mile journey to the pageant in a clapped out camper van.

Each member of the family has their own quirks that make them special and it is the development of the characters along the way that makes this film truly memorable. From the teenage anst ridden older brother inspired to observe a vow of silence by Nietzsche, to the hapless dad who believes that everyone in life can be a 'winner' if only they choose to purchase and follow his hilariously desperate 'nine step' programme - this family is unique, dysfunctional but exude a warmth that is all-enveloping and familiar.

As well as being laugh-out-loud funny from start to finish, 'Little Miss Sunshine' is touching, and even uncomfortable to watch at times, especially when the precocious young beauty queens strut their stuff for the judges in their desperate attempts to emulate the success of seasoned professionals such as 'Miss California'.

It's quite easy to see why this film has reaped such high critical acclaim. If you want to be moved to tears, one minute from laughing and the next from crying, then this is the film for you.

137 out of 152 people found this review helpful

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Not so bright, it hurts my eyes

Mbub from Westbury, Wilts , 11/09/2007

A failing family come together for the youngest member so that she can enter the Little Miss Sunshine contest. I have heard great things about this movie and a few bad ones, but for me personally I didn't see anything special about it. It was basic story-telling and a sad reflection of that. Yes it was not a run of the mill Hollywood movie, no action, no animation, no special effects, but it also has no real story either. The acting from the Grandad was the best bit in the film, other than that it wasn't amazing, or brilliant. It actually reminded me of a ITV drama. Only watch if you have nothing better to do.

60 out of 87 people found this review helpful

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A flawless ray of sunshine!

A customer from North London , 22/09/2006

Now this is what I call an impeccable film!WHY DON'T THEY MAKE MORE FILMS LIKE THIS?!!!Superb cast,but what really makes the film flawless are the characters and how they affect the story. This is a family who eat take out chicken every night out of paper plates!The dad (the brilliant Greg Kinnear)is trying to crack into the Self Help market with his 9 step plan. He is hillarious because he takes his business a bit too seriously (always quoting what winners do compared to losers), the mum (Toni Collete)and seeming breadwinner of the family has just inherited her suicidal, gay brother on top of already having her sex mad, coke snorting father-in-law to contend with. Her teenage son has decided to take a vow of silence till he becomes a test pilot and her youngest-,geeky Olive who is really the ray of sunshine in the film. It is Olive that takes us on an adventure of her family and her understanding of what life is all about. The film is funny and deeply human because is makes us realise the complexity and frailty of being a human being. What a lovely, majestic, warm, funny feel good film.I can understand why it has been received so well by the public, as it taps into so many issues that are quite universal. But I think what made many smile is that for an hour and a half we remember what it like to be an innocent child, in a state of awe living life unhampered by limits , and I guess that is a place that as adults we all miss and long for. For once I've gone to see a movie and it has left me with something....and I haven't quite figured out what, all I know is that when the movie finished I had a big smile on my face and I felt quite amazing for having watched it ....

Little Miss Sunshine

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