The "Feel-Nothing" Movie of the Year

Rating: 2/10 (19 February 2008)

I'm really shocked by the number of people who liked this movie. I found so little to like about it. I didn't care about any of these people. Maybe if their van had careened off the side of the road at the end of the movie, exploding into a fiery blaze, I'd have given this a few more stars.
Specifically, what did I dislike?
First there were the unbelievable plot contrivances.
Like, somehow, Olive is the runner up in a local pageant. Does anyone really think that, with her outfit (and what talent was she doing at that time, since Grandpa was still working with her on developing a routine), hair, etc., she would have been runner up?
And even if this were possible, at the higher level, things were so radically different, and no one had an inkling? And no one happened to have seen her routine prior to the big show?
And, oh, yeah, Olive happens to find some eye exams in the doctor's office (because we all find eye exams in waiting rooms), so that later her brother can conveniently learn that he is color blind and therefore unable to fly planes.
Oh, and could I just mention how I loathed the little plot lines featuring the dirty magazines? I don't mind a little clever smutty humor in a movie. This was not it, however. It was not clever, and it was not funny. It did, however, serve to underscore how, indeed, Frank et al. were losers.
Enough, though, of the stupidity of the plot. Let's talk about how unlikeable the characters were (well, except for Olive, who simply wasn't enough of a force on screen to counter the other characters).
Grandpa: Heroin addicted (dies presumably of an overdose), vulgar and foul mouthed, urges his minor grandson to go out and screw girls as much as possible (of course, he said it in cruder language), and teaches his granddaughter a stripper routine.
Am I the only one who does not find this kind of thing amusing? I kept hoping he would die--unfortunately, it wasn't until about half way through the movie.
Frank: Another loser. A pompous ass who spouts about being a Proust scholar. Oh, and the minute they happen to discover that the brother is color blind--the very minute!--he comes right out with the info that the brother cannot fly planes. Because he's an insensitive, self-centered jerk. Why oh why didn't Frank do the job right when he tried to off himself earlier? Then I wouldn't have been subject to him either.
Dad: Just when you think maybe Dad might have a few redeeming qualities, he implies that Olive is fat. Because he's a loser.
Mom and the brother: Just there. I didn't care if they lived, died, whatever.
I kept waiting for some sort of closure--mom and dad smiling conspiratorially at the end, everyone in the car doing a very Bradyesque "Yeah, as long as we've got each other, nothing can keep us down". I would have liked the movie a tad better if it had had closure, and more positive closure.
Or the van careening off the road in a fiery blaze.
All in all, one of the worst movies I've seen in a long time.