Little Miss Sunshine (2006)
Directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris
DVD PN1995.9.C55 L577 2006
Who doesn’t like a good story about a colorful dysfunctional family? Better yet, who doesn’t like a great story?
The film Little Miss Sunshine opens with us looking into the eyes of a young girl as she appears to be looking at us. But, the reflection on her glasses tells us that she’s watching something; and, that something turns out to be how pageant contestants respond to winning and losing. The young girl, Olive, is practicing the look of spontaneity of winning. Going in we know this film is about dreams, illusions, hopes, and fears.
Employing a classic structure of introducing each character in turn, we meet the Hoovers: Olive (Abigail Breslin), the young girl we’ve just seen who has competed in and dreams of pageants; Richard (Greg Kinnear), her father, who has a nine step program to becoming a winner – though he himself is not; Sheryl (Toni Collette), Olive’s mom who is frazzled but is all about family; Olive’s Grandpa (Alan Arkin) – who snorts heroin, sprinkles his conversations with profanity and was “asked” to leave a retirement home - has taught and works with Olive on her pageant dance routine; her teenage brother Dwayne (Paul Dano) who, after reading Nietzsche, has taken a vow of silence even as he dreams of getting into flight school; and Olive’s uncle, Frank (Steve Carell), the number one Proust scholar in the world, who has tried to kill himself after a graduate student he fell in love with left him for the number two Proust scholar who - to add to Frank’s depression - has been awarded a MacArthur genius grant.
After each character is deftly sketched everyone is brought together for dinner. Not just a dinner but - once again - take-out fried chicken dinner! And, with dinner we get the dynamics of all of the family. Uncle Frank is our window into the family as his sister, Sheryl, has brought him home from the hospital because, she’s told, he shouldn’t be left alone. It’s a brilliant set piece masterfully performed and we see each character’s personality and learn that Dwayne hates everybody. But fate or luck has dictated that Olive will be able to participate in the Little Miss Sunshine pageant – she only has to get to California by the weekend. Life conspires that everyone will have to pile into the family yellow and white VW Microbus: it’s the essence of America, the road trip!
The trip – in quest of the dream at the end of the highway - this time in California - is one of turns missed, roads not taken; of detours and roadblocks: the quintessential journey of discovery. Part of what makes the film work so well is the brilliance each actor brings to his or her role – everyone is spot-on including the character actors who populate the fringes of the film. And, each person begins to learn more about themselves and the family as they get closer and closer to the pageant. The perfect metaphor: after an eventful journey, while they can see the hotel where the pageant is being held, they can only get there with some creative driving! Which makes them – after everything the Hoovers have gone through – seconds past the competition sign-in deadline: after such an arduous trip will Olive be denied the opportunity to compete?
The Little Miss Sunshine pageant taps into and is part of the American dream. The pageant participants and their families are actual participants who perform their own competition routines. Priceless would be one way of describing how the pageant unfolds. How Olive performs - and how the Hoovers respond - shows how each family member has been transformed and reminds us that quite often it’s the trip and not the destination that is most important.
The award winning screenplay is from the literate and talented Michael Arndt who employs classical allusions in the structure of the story that resonate subconsciously throughout the film. The VW Microbus could well be a tiny vessel from Greek antiquity bobbing in the Aegean or a long boat on sandy shores being pushed into the sea by a running crew. But Arndt’s screenplay is generous not only to the actors with pitch perfect dialogue but allows the first time feature film directors to tell the story visually. What elevates Little Miss Sunshine to a great film is contained in the opening scene: by looking into Olive’s eyes we are really looking into ourselves.
Producers: Albert Berger, Michael Beugg, Jeb Brody, David Friendly, Bart Lipton, Peter Saraf,
Marc Turtletaub, Ron Yerxa
Directors: Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris
Screenplay: Michael Arndt
Cinematography: Tim Suhrstedt
Art Direction: Alan Muraoka
Music: Mychael Danna and DeVotchKa
Film Editing: Pamela Martin
