Little Miss-Guided

Rating: Null/10 (5 February 2007)

This comment contains SPOILERS**************SPOILERS FOLLOW*************************
Little Miss Sunshine is a film that doesn't really know what it wants to be. Is it a commentary on kiddie beauty pageants? Is it a black comedy about a severely dysfunctional family? Is it a message movie that "family is everything?"
The family is super-dysfunctional. Alan Arkin is a cranky, foul-mouthed Grandpa who's been kicked out of a nursing home, snorts cocaine, and when he dies the family takes his body out of the hospital and drives it in the back of the station wagon until they decide what to do with it. Paul Dano is the troubled son who hates everyone and has taken a vow of silence until he gets admitted into the Air Force Academy. Steve Carell is the brother who has botched an attempted suicide. Toni Collette is the mother and Greg Kinnear is the motivational speaker who heads this severely dysfunctional family. Abigail Breslin is the pot bellied little kid who wants to win a beauty pageant. The beauty pageant scenes are the most effective with extremely gross mothers and their even worse young daughters made up Jon Benet Ramsey style parading around in adult makeup and costumes. But these are only a small part of the movie.
The directors' credentials are only MTV videos. Big deal. I don't know what all the fuss is about this film. If you want a real black comedy with some teeth see "The Loved One" or "Dr. Strangelove."