I am the Queen of the Netflix queue in our house. Since S doesn't bother to create/manage online accounts and suggest movies, I get to have all the fun. To his credit, he rarely ever protests about any movie I get. God-given tremendous patience stands him in good stead while watching movies and it is I that usually ends up walking away from a boring movie mid-way through.
I marketed "Little Miss Sunshine" as a comedy movie. It got two Oscars and I saw some good reviews online. Figured it would be a nice evening watch. 20 minutes into the movie, S and J were staring me down asking me what in the world made this a "comedy" movie?!! S said that he only found the movie pathetic, not funny. I turned around for support and found my father staring very intently at the TV screen, hands crossed, brows drawn in concentration.
"Appa, don't you find this funny?"
"I haven't understood a single dialogue in this movie for the past 20 minutes.I am staring at the screen in the hopes I'll get at least a single dialogue before I go to bed."
Doh. Okay. No luck there. Soon S and J bailed out too.
I finally managed to finish the movie yesterday. I have to admit that it wasn't an out-and-out, laugh-out-loud funny movie. It is dark humor all the way through. But watching the antics of the characters on screen, I couldn't help chuckling a couple of times. But toward the end, I was more disturbed and shocked than anything else.
The story revolves around little Olive Hoover. She has a dysfunctional family with a foul-mouthed grandpa, an aggressive father who wants to win at any cost, a homosexual uncle who is recovering from a suicide attempt and a Nietzche-reading brother who has sworn a vow of silence until he becomes a pilot. Olive herself dreams of becoming a beauty queen and the entire family drives her to one such contest called "Little Miss Sunshine".
The final few scenes showed how beauty contests for young children work. It was awful to watch 7 year old kids made up like adults, doing adult-like moves and even looking like them! One of the contestant girls had exactly a doll face (I swear. No exaggeration. It was like watching the doll in "Child's Play" come alive!). And I positively squirmed when Olive decides to do a pseudo strip-tease dance on stage. Ugh.
So, anyway, if you're just looking for a fun movie to watch, please don't pick "Little Miss Sunshine". If you want to get a good dose of reality, then watch this movie.
1 comment:
I loved Little Miss Sunshine.:) for all the right reasons. It was no wonder it was nominated for a bunch of Oscars that year, including Abigail Breslin for best actress and Alan Arkin (the grandfather) for best supporting actor. In fact, the latter is on screen for only 20 mins but wins the academy award..:)
p.s: the song in the end, where the little girl does the burlesque is called " superfreak" by Rick James. You might have seen it in the new mastercard ad.
If you like these nice little indie movies, I recommend (500) days of summer.
Post a Comment