Watchable.....barely

Rating: 5/10 (24 December 2006)

The Hoover family takes a trip to California so daughter Olive (Breslin) can compete in the Little Miss Sunshine Pageant.
This movie takes too long a time to get to what this is all about. That is besides telling the story of a dysfunctional family. More on that later. Where it eventually goes is to the Little Miss Sunshine Pageant in California where young daughter Olive (Breslin) will compete. Seems grandpa (Arkin) has taught Olive some new moves and no one has seen them until she is finally on stage. Without knowing what she is doing she satirizes the whole concept of child beauty pageants and tells the world what the competition is really all about. Yes, that does sound interesting, doesn't it? Remember, I said it takes too long to get here.
The family: Father, Richard (Kinnear), is a failed motivational speaker who is trying to publish his 9-steps to success; Son, Dwayne (Dano), hasn't spoken to anyone in over a year and won't until he gets accepted to the USAF Academy to become a pilot; Grandpa (Arkin) is a dirty old man who lets loose with F-bombs at the drop of a hat; Wife, Sheryl (Collette), is sort of okay but is too supportive of the rest of the family when she shouldn't be; Frank (Carrell) Sheryl's brother is gay, and failed a suicide attempt and has just been released from the hospital. Olive (Breslin) is the only normal and innocent one in all this. You learn all this very early in the movie.
Although billed as a comedy, it is lite-drama and there are some almost good lines in here, but to give any would give too much away and there weren't many anyway. You are not missing anything. The physical comedy is old, tired and no longer works. One would think that a dysfunctional family would garner some comedy, but not here, well, save for some okay good lines just mentioned, but cannot be divulged. And, again, you are still not missing anything. The lines were good, not great. Read my lips: you are not missing anything.
The acting is fine. It's the script until the competition and even there it still needed work.
The ending is what bothered me the most. By my account there wasn't one. If you watch this, you will see. And, no this doesn't open the door to a sequel. At least I hope not. They wouldn't, would they? Oh, God!