Little Miss Sunshine Review

There is something about humor and road movies that seems to come hand in hand. Just think about, wherever we find a vehicle, a mismatched group of civilians, and an end goal we always in turn find quirky, hilarious humor. However, there is something else that seems to hitch a ride with road movies, and that's drama. It seems so strange, that a single genre can act as the perfect catalyst to bring two polar opposite emotions together in perfect balance. Which begs the question: why? How is it that a single genre can work so perfectly in doing one of the arguably hardest things to do in all of cinema? I the answer is quite simple. You see, there is always an element that is touching or sentimental about road movies that if not balanced with humor would become sappy and melodramatic. So in a way, one could say that it is by necessity that road movies excel at the balancing-act that is a drama-comedy. "Little Miss Sunshine" is the art of this balancing act seen thoroughly refined to perfection, a carefully crafted and heart warming story about the logistics of what makes a loser but moreover what makes a winner.

Like many great films, "Little Miss Sunshine" is quick to establish its narrative. In the beginning scene we see a young girl (Abigail Breslin) wearing thick glasses staring intently at a television screen. What is she doing? Studying. She's studying as to what should be her proper reaction when she is crowned Miss America. Next we see a person which we can safely assume is her father (Greg Kinnear.) A man who is giving a motivational pep-talk on how to be successful to a whopping crowd of about half dozen people, maybe less. At last we see a sunken eyed man who seems to be sulking in his own pain and misery (Steve Carrel, yes that's right, Steve Carrel.) From this we quickly know what "Little Miss Sunshine" is about: determination, dreams, and harsh reality.

The young girl we see gazing into the T.V. screen is miss Olive Hoover, beauty pageant enthusiast. She has apparently been wooing the audiences throughout New Mexico with her routine and now it seems as though she'll be able to compete at the nationally renowned Little Miss Sunshine Pageant. Though we never get to see her routine until the very end, she seems an unlikely contestant. She has no noteworthy facial or body features, a set of values that is sadly enforced onto young girls her age if they wish to compete in such competition, and wears thick lensed glasses. However, she is going nonetheless.

Her father is Richard Hoover, a somewhat narrow minded (perhaps only to shield himself from reality) man that believes through his "Nine Step Program" anyone can achieve their dreams. Despite the fact that he has been going at it for years now and has come to no avail.

The sunken-eyed sulk we saw earlier is her uncle. A man who was once the number one Proust Scholar in the united states. However due to a series of very, very unfortunate events, such as the loss of his homosexual love interest to his arch rival, he lost everything and attempted to kill himself. However he failed at that as well. Carrel's frank portrayal of this man that lives enamored in his pain is nothing short of noteworthy. There is a scene when Olive asks him what happened to his arms and he simply replies "Well, I tried to kill myself." However, even in all his character's gloom Carrel still manages to be funny, a sign of a truly talented and wise comic.

One could go on about the characters in this film for pages, however that would be redundant. The long and short of it is: all the characters have and/or had goals which they are/were trying to achieve.

As I stated earlier, "Little Miss Sunshine" lends itself to a tightly constructed narrative, featuring definitive lines, scenes, and themes and pitch perfect performances. The most important theme of the film is the push. From beginning to end there seems to be one to many obstacles in the way of Olive reaching her final goal. Starting off with a simple dilemma of the most economic way to get to the beauty pageant all the way to having to literally push the car until it is going fast enough to start off in fourth gear. Another motif is the family's protection of Olive. There is a scene in which her grandfather is telling her older brother to "fuck a lot of women" while she sits just a few feet away listening to her CD-player. When she takes off her headphones to ask them what they're talking about the grandfather simply replies, "Politics." There are scenes like this throughout the film that depict the entire family's, including the seemingly indefatigable father, concern for Olive's innocence and determination. Her childlike naivety (after all, she is a child) is something they all seem to admire and desire, however, cannot attain simply due to their cynicism. Not to say that they're cynics, just that there is something about adolescence and adulthood that gives way to that aspect of human nature.

Near the middle of the film Olive begins to notice a lot of what her family is doing for her and subsequently becomes worried about the pageant. She professes her fear to her grandfather saying that her father hates and losers, and if she loses her father will in turn hate her. Comforting her her grandfather kneels down beside her bed and says "You know what a loser is? A real loser is somebody that's so afraid of not winning they don't even try. Now, you're trying, right?" to which she replies "Yeah" "Well, then you're not a loser." If someone wanted to find the moral of this film they need look no further than this scene. There are very few times in cinema where a narrative can be brought together by something so simple and yet be so profound.

For all its intents, purposes, and use of mechanics "Little Miss Sunshine" is perfect film. It will tug your heart strings, hit your funny bone and leave you feeling profoundly moved and thoroughly entertained.