tao_: Things I didn't buy about 'Little Miss Sunshine' (spoilers ahoy!)

Graham (

tao_) wrote,
@ 2007-02-14 13:40:00

Things I didn't buy about 'Little Miss Sunshine' (spoilers ahoy!)
1. Stealing the body.
2. The motorcycle cop leafing through the porn mags while a whole family sits inside a van waiting. "Yeah...I love this stuff...yeeeaaahhhhh....whoah, baby.."
3. The kid who's not speaking because he reads Neitzsche--all right, buying it so far...but the same kid is frustrated because--you ready?-- he wants to join the air force.
4. Family delighted because their ten year-old child is dancing like a slut.
5. The 'boy' who broke Steve Carell's heart is audience-friendly chunky tennis coach-type guy rather than more likely, wispy 'Death In Venice'-type. Gay love interests only acceptable in Hollywood movies if they look like male models in their mid-twenties.
6. Steve Carell is foremost Proust scholar in America but never says anything interesting.

I'm sure there's more but the batteries on my laptop are about to run out.

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(Anonymous)
2007-02-14 02:28 pm UTC (link)

There is something quite masochistic about my reaction to stuff like this. I enjoyed the film a great deal (although the critical reaction has been hugely overblown) yet almost equally enjoy reading things like this which show how meretricious the film is. The same thing happened with 'The Royal Tenenbaums'.

Still better than a lot of stuff I've seen recently.

Jasper Goodballoon

goodballoon.blogspot.com

(Reply to this)

	flamingkitties 2007-02-14 03:31 pm UTC (link)
	Yeah, everyone was going on about this film....so I rented it. It's okay. But it didn't feel complete, there was something not right about it, I enjoyed it, but it felt like it was trying to be deep without giving anyone anything to wade through. (Reply to this)

	moleintheground 2007-02-14 05:10 pm UTC (link)
	Graham, hmm. You're one of the great comedy writers. You have a loveable face. But you must, must, must put spoilers behind cuts. It's the polite thing to do. (Reply to this)

	bergenboi 2007-02-14 07:29 pm UTC (link)
	Thing I hated most about Little Miss Sunshine: The idiot girl sitting behind me who kept saying things like "BUT WHAT ABOUT THE LITTLE GIRL!?" when they left Olive behind at the gas station. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	bergenboi 2007-02-14 07:30 pm UTC (link)
	I should clarify that said girl was in her 20s. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	(Anonymous) 2007-02-16 03:27 pm UTC (link)
	That reminds me of a girl sat near me when I saw Stewart Lee live. "..you wouldnt like me when I'm Ang Lee" he said 3 or 4 times. Only then did she laugh, "hahaha...angry..." (Reply to this)(Parent)

	joy_disaster 2007-02-14 07:52 pm UTC (link)
	Yup. You got it. The part I really laughed at was Olive ripping off her "break-away" pants. The rest? Meh. (Reply to this)

arampus
2007-02-15 01:25 am UTC (link)

I'm not sure I buy the idea that credibility is a critical issue. That sounds snotty, sorry. I mean, I think this film is 'quite broad characters in extreme situations' stuff, but done with a sort of 'Sideways'-y tone that implies a certain amount of authenticity that it doesn't really have - or need to have. By the way, I have never written anything proper in my entire life and it's past my bedtime.

(Reply to this)

	tao_ 2007-02-15 02:27 pm UTC (link)
	Just remembered another one--the back seat colour blindness test. (Reply to this)

(Anonymous)
2007-02-16 12:14 pm UTC (link)

Sorry. I have to protest.

1. I bought them thinking stealing the body was the only option. I didn't buy them actually getting away with it.

2. Ok - this bit was completely extraneous. And completely unbelievable, but I think this was a last minute addition in order to counter the family stealing the body with such ease. It's like the writer felt like he had to revert to script-writing for dummies. (Rule 1.a - The hero must overcome obstacles to reach his goal.) Or he just wanted to crowbar a gag about gay porn in. Which was quite funny. What was the magazine called again? Guns and bummo?

3. I thought he was taking a vow of silence until he joined the airforce to show how much of a disciplined uber-mensch he was. Hence I bought this - Those crazy straight-edge kids. Barrel of laughs, each and every one. Just imagine him listening to Minor Threat and it makes a lot more sense.

4. She wasn't dancing like a slut. She he has no idea that any of the moves are designed to be sexually provocative. It's a six year olds interpretation of how to dance like a popstar (with added moves by grandad which she's imitating as seen). The dance especially doesn't seem slutty* compared to the previous horror parade of dead-eyed, bikini-clad, lip-glossed, hyper-sexualised six year olds who have been molded to look and act like vacant sluts by their parents.

(*In fact it's almost embarrassing because her attempt to approximate adult sexuality is nowhere near as good as all the others.)

I too would be delighted if my daughter was the only child on that stage who actually appeared to be having fun.

5 - I thought this character was supposed to be an unrequited love interest. And I could buy Carrell's character falling for a chino clad Vanderbilt wannabe type character.

6 - He's not in a situation conducive to high-brow debate. He tries too but he's shot down (A la mode....). He's also suicidal. Suicidal people never tend to be, er, at their most engaging.

Sorry, finished now. Please remember it was so much better than pretty much any other film labled comedy last year.

Speaking of which - Art School Confidential. What went wrong?

(Reply to this)(Thread)

tao_
2007-02-16 02:05 pm UTC (link)

3. Yup. I see your point.

4. Disagree. How is Grandad's tutelage different from the training the other kids have undergone? So he's taught her how to be a Fergie-style, up-to-date slut, rather than the old school vacant bimbo type. Big advance! The other kids have no idea they've been sexualised either. Still don't make it right.

6. See your point here too...but still feel it's a prime example of telling not showing. "Trust me, he's a genius" is essentially what the screenwriter is saying, when he offers nothing to back it up (aside from "a la mode").

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

hehadvanished
2007-02-20 09:47 pm UTC (link)

Some excellent points brought up by the anonymous commenter, including his query in re: ASC.

Regarding point four: My interpretation of the movie was that Olive was, in the end, different from the other girls because she learned that the goal to which she had always clung (winning a pageant) was not as much fun as dancing with her family. But the movie's pretty ambiguous on how Olive feels about the conclusion of her arc, so you could just as easily interpret otherwise. Is that ambiguity a strength or a weakness?

On point six: scholars are sometimes not as insightful as one would think. Also, I think that character might've "switched off" his scholarliness due to malaise. As in, "oh woe, I can no longer be bothered to engage in abstract thought processes due to the overwhelming pain of existence." I think that's why the simplicity of Dwight's intentions may have appealed to him.

And as far as point five goes: it is not unusual, particularly among the oppressed, to develop an attraction to symbols of dominance or hegemony. A more common example would be gays who fetishize cops and bikers.

(Reply to this)(Parent)

	irishjanet 2007-02-19 04:17 pm UTC (link)
	D'you know what I didn't buy? That stupid cushion they had around Olive's stomach. I know pre-teen girls often have little pot bellies, but she looked like one of those middle-aged men who are always hitching up their Farah trousers to meet their Guinness polo-shirts. (Reply to this)

rickyy
2007-03-02 09:30 pm UTC (link)

7. The organisers of the event finding Olive's act repulsive yet finding the rest completely normal.
8. The horn beeping stops as the policeman looks in the trunk, then later resumes only at a lesser volume. For obvious reasons but it's not good enough.
9. The fact that Carrell's character acceded in buying a gay porn mag didn't fit with his character and was just a lame way of fitting in the referral back from the later scene where the cop notices it and (reacts).
10. The swift transition of the Neitzsche kid from mute to talkative precipitated by a single "I think you might be color-blind" comment.
11. Stealing the body. (Again)

However, I enjoyed it.

(Reply to this)

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