Contrived but fun

Rating: 6/10 (27 July 2006)

I went to this sneak preview really wanting to like the movie. I really like Alan Arkin, Toni Collette, and Steve Carell. The plot was deliciously dark: a dysfunctional family goes on a road trip so the young daughter can participate in a beauty pageant.
But, the problem is that the movie screamed "I'm an indie flick." From the poster to the commercials, I should have been warned that it would fall into the traps that these independent films generally do. But, I had high hopes.
Nevertheless they were somewhat dashed. Little Miss Sunshine is indeed a darkish comedy of sorts, but only of the most contrived sort. The family in Little Miss Sunshine neither feels like a family nor acts like they are connected by having lived together for years. The family includes:

Olive, the young daughter who asks all the good questions that need to be asked for the movie to develop its plot.

Richard, the over-talkative father who spouts self-help while calling everybody losers. He is depending on a book deal that may not come through.

Sheryl, the working mother who is impatient with the whole situation.

Dwayne, the Nitzche-reading son who has taken a vow of silence until he can get into the air force to fly jets.

Grandpa, the perverted old man who snorts heroin and is also Olive's coach.

Frank, Sheryl's homosexual brother, fresh off an attempted suicide after a failed relationship with his grad student.

At the beginning of the movie, Olive is given the Sunnydale regional Little Miss Sunshine title due to her placing second and first place was forced to drop out. The last-minute nature of the phone call sends the family into a flurry of action leading to the decision that everybody will be in the VW van for the road trip.
The road trip consists of many odd and stupid contrivances in order to set up for repeated jokes and motifs. The van's clutch drops out, which causes everybody to push it in order to drive it. Phone signals drop out at inconvenient times, and chance situations all pile on top of each other. Add to these contrivances the fact that none of the family reacts like people who have known each other for years. They act and react like characters in a cheap play.
The only one who moderately pulls it off is Toni Collette. Thankfully, Toni has the timing and grace of a truly caring mother trying to hold the family together.
However, the comic aspects of the rest of the performers are all spot on. The movie isn't all bad. When it is funny, it is frequently hilarious. Especially when it is believable. When the situations aren't so constructed to seem like they were written solely for laughs, Little Miss Sunshine really shines. When it isn't believable it is tiresome and stretched.
Paul Dano also shines in the first half-hour of the movie when he acts like a child who is tired of the family. But, by the end, he just isn't trying nearly as hard as he was.
Steve Carell and Greg Kinnear also flex their comic timing muscle in the movie as they can. They make their jokes work even when they aren't working.
For the dark humor that the movie gets right, it is an enjoyable movie. It isn't bad, it just isn't great. It just doesn't click.
B-