fun family road picture but where are the seatbelts?

Rating: 8/10 (22 August 2006)

Death, drug addiction, attempted suicide, emotional instability - these are just a few of the elements that make up what is fast turning into the sleeper hit comedy of 2006 - "Little Miss Sunshine," in which an extended family of six piles into its rickety minivan and takes a thousand mile road trip from Albuquerque, New Mexico to Newport Beach, California, so that their daughter can compete in a beauty pageant for pre-teen girls. Needless to say, the family experiences many colorful and lesson-instilling adventures along the way.
The characters, for the most part, fall into that category that anyone familiar with independent movie-making will instantly recognize as the "photogenically dysfunctional." That is to say each has his own individualized "quirk" stamped onto his character to make him both "weird" and "recognizable" at the same time. The father, Frank (Greg Kinnear), is a win-at-all-costs motivational speaker who has designed a nine-step program for success that he expects not only his clients but his own family members to internalize and follow. Cheryl (Toni Collette) is his generally pragmatic wife whose relative sanity is the only thing that seems to be keeping the rest of the family from spinning off into unrestrained movie quirkdom. Frank's father (Alan Arkin) is a cantankerous, heroin-sniffing old man who cusses a blue streak, obsesses over pornography, and says everything that is on his mind no matter how politically incorrect in nature. Frank (Steve Carell) is Cheryl's morose gay brother who has just been released from a mental hospital for a failed suicide attempt. Dwayne (Paul Dano) is the teenaged son who wants to be an Air Force pilot and has taken a vow of silence until he reaches that goal. Finally, Olive (Abigail Breslin) is the adorable little moppet with dreams of winning the Little Miss Sunshine pageant and who seems, along with her mother, to be the one levelheaded thinker in the group.
This is, for the most part, a charming, extremely well acted film that can be very entertaining provided one doesn't go into it expecting too much. The conflicts and interactions among the various characters are often sharp and shrewdly observed, and directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris keep the tone and pace of the film lighthearted and breezy (even in its darker moments). The screenplay by Michael Arndt walks a fine line between cynicism and sentiment, only occasionally stumbling along the way. Unfortunately, about halfway through the film, one of the most engaging and entertaining characters drops off the radar screen, and his absence is definitely felt. There are also a few too many sitcom level routines and situations, and the scene at the beauty pageant comes perilously close to endorsing the very thing - the sexualizing of pre-pubescent girls - that the film is supposed to be savaging (although I can see where the filmmakers could mount a counter argument to me here, but I'm not sure it would be all that convincing).
Although all the performers are fine, Toni Collette is really the one who brings this film to life. In portraying the one generally "normal" adult on hand, Collette lets reasonableness and common sense guide her reactions to the near-surrealistic events that are happening to them. And young Abigail Breslin is a natural-born scene-stealer.
Apart from its few flaws (including the fact that not a single one of the six riders in the car - not even the little girl - is ever seen wearing a seatbelt), "Little Miss Sunshine" is a winning film that seems to be saying that, good, bad or indifferent, family is what really matters in the end.