little miss sunshine and comedy legends of retail
i saw - and really, really enjoyed - little miss sunshine last night. it is about a family who travel across the u.s in a camper van to take the daughter to the finals of a beauty pageant. i've been reading a fair amount of reviews this morning - some of which seem to take issue with the fact that it seems to routinely check all the boxes that comprise what my friend jim would describe as a 'quirky' film (read: wes anderson, american independent cinema of the last 10 years etc). true it has sundance festival written all over it, but simultaneously i found it to be really enjoyable with some seriously fine performances and moments of genuine emotion (i think i gasped at the fate of one character at one rather pivotal point).
i've been writing too much about issues of tone recently, and this film is interesting as it works at an extremely low-key register but punctuated with immediate moments of comedy and tragedy. why i would take issue with jason statham and amy smart having public sex in crank and not with an entire family getting up on a stage and dancing in the most ridiculous fashion imaginable is not a matter of personal taste. the manner with which the characters develop in little miss sunshine is such that you believe they would do what they do for each other - whereas there is no such sense in crank (at least, considering how that scene plays out). there are a couple of scenes in little miss sunshine which appear inconsequential in a cause-and-effect narrative, but actually inform us about the deep-seated relationships held by family members. i'm thinking of one in particular: where the whole family are eating breakfast in a diner and olive - the little girl - orders ice cream, and greg kinnear (her father) gives her this pompous speech about how beauty queens don't eat ice cream. it should be noted that kinnear is - at least on the surface - a naive self-involved git at this point. olive pushes the ice cream away from her and - in order to counterbalance kinnear's pomposity, the grandpa, the son and the brother (steve carrell) start eating her ice cream and saying how good it is. they all know that she really wants the dessert, and that she looks up to these elder people as potential role models (if they're doing it then it must be okay). as a result, olive yells "don't eat it all" and starts eating her ice cream. the scene ends here. from this exchange, we know that the entire family - in their different ways - care for the young olive. kinnear is trying to advise her on the path to success (which he considers to be the key to happiness), whilst the others let her do what they know she really wants to (because they do not consider it to be harmful to her). it is this sort of understated moment that really makes little miss sunshine. they do not have the too obvious gravity and supposed profundity of comparable moments in, for example, garden state.
a lot of people have also written about it as a satire about the american culture of beauty pageantry. before one could write about this, they would have to consider the character of miss california (a current beauty queen who olive idolises, and meets when she is signing autographs at the junior pageant). i felt that she comes off entirely sympathetically, because she acts in a genuinely lovely way to olive when she asks her about ice cream and is also totally enjoying and respecting olive's performance - which sends the rest of the beauty pageantry 'institution' into uproar - at the end. the film is scathing towards something, but it is certainly not the general concept and culture of the beauty pageant. perhaps it is something more specific, i'm not sure.
good film, go see it if you still get a chance.
in response to the anecdotes related this morning by richdudley about an amusing till operator in hmv, i'd like to tell a story of my own which i don't think i wrote about in here. about a month ago, i had to phone O2 to pay my phone bill. these people do not usually let on that they have any personality, preferring to stick to the script on the computer in front of them. i first knew this guy would be a legend when he was asking me the security questions required to get into my account. "what's your address? what's your date of birth? and, last but not least, what's your mother's maiden name?". perhaps not particularly funny by itself, but it struck me out of left field that he actually said something that indicated a hint of individuality. and then - you know when you read out your credit card number over a telephone and you do it 2 or 3 numbers at a time, waiting for the other person to acknowledge they've written them down. well, i was doing that, and every time he had a different response.
me: two-three (this isn't my real credit card number, i don't even have a credit card)
him: uh-huh
me: one-six
him: yep
me: seven-five
him: okay
me: eight-four
him: wicked
me: three-six
him: brilliant
every time he said something different. when i latched on to what he was doing, i had to suppress a giggle and he suddenly broke out, "awww mate i'm just keeping it interesting, y'know? this is such a boring job!" and i tell him it's all good and start laughing and he laughs and we're friends. loved it. this is way too long.
i've been writing too much about issues of tone recently, and this film is interesting as it works at an extremely low-key register but punctuated with immediate moments of comedy and tragedy. why i would take issue with jason statham and amy smart having public sex in crank and not with an entire family getting up on a stage and dancing in the most ridiculous fashion imaginable is not a matter of personal taste. the manner with which the characters develop in little miss sunshine is such that you believe they would do what they do for each other - whereas there is no such sense in crank (at least, considering how that scene plays out). there are a couple of scenes in little miss sunshine which appear inconsequential in a cause-and-effect narrative, but actually inform us about the deep-seated relationships held by family members. i'm thinking of one in particular: where the whole family are eating breakfast in a diner and olive - the little girl - orders ice cream, and greg kinnear (her father) gives her this pompous speech about how beauty queens don't eat ice cream. it should be noted that kinnear is - at least on the surface - a naive self-involved git at this point. olive pushes the ice cream away from her and - in order to counterbalance kinnear's pomposity, the grandpa, the son and the brother (steve carrell) start eating her ice cream and saying how good it is. they all know that she really wants the dessert, and that she looks up to these elder people as potential role models (if they're doing it then it must be okay). as a result, olive yells "don't eat it all" and starts eating her ice cream. the scene ends here. from this exchange, we know that the entire family - in their different ways - care for the young olive. kinnear is trying to advise her on the path to success (which he considers to be the key to happiness), whilst the others let her do what they know she really wants to (because they do not consider it to be harmful to her). it is this sort of understated moment that really makes little miss sunshine. they do not have the too obvious gravity and supposed profundity of comparable moments in, for example, garden state.
a lot of people have also written about it as a satire about the american culture of beauty pageantry. before one could write about this, they would have to consider the character of miss california (a current beauty queen who olive idolises, and meets when she is signing autographs at the junior pageant). i felt that she comes off entirely sympathetically, because she acts in a genuinely lovely way to olive when she asks her about ice cream and is also totally enjoying and respecting olive's performance - which sends the rest of the beauty pageantry 'institution' into uproar - at the end. the film is scathing towards something, but it is certainly not the general concept and culture of the beauty pageant. perhaps it is something more specific, i'm not sure.
good film, go see it if you still get a chance.
in response to the anecdotes related this morning by richdudley about an amusing till operator in hmv, i'd like to tell a story of my own which i don't think i wrote about in here. about a month ago, i had to phone O2 to pay my phone bill. these people do not usually let on that they have any personality, preferring to stick to the script on the computer in front of them. i first knew this guy would be a legend when he was asking me the security questions required to get into my account. "what's your address? what's your date of birth? and, last but not least, what's your mother's maiden name?". perhaps not particularly funny by itself, but it struck me out of left field that he actually said something that indicated a hint of individuality. and then - you know when you read out your credit card number over a telephone and you do it 2 or 3 numbers at a time, waiting for the other person to acknowledge they've written them down. well, i was doing that, and every time he had a different response.
me: two-three (this isn't my real credit card number, i don't even have a credit card)
him: uh-huh
me: one-six
him: yep
me: seven-five
him: okay
me: eight-four
him: wicked
me: three-six
him: brilliant
every time he said something different. when i latched on to what he was doing, i had to suppress a giggle and he suddenly broke out, "awww mate i'm just keeping it interesting, y'know? this is such a boring job!" and i tell him it's all good and start laughing and he laughs and we're friends. loved it. this is way too long.