Review of Little Miss Sunshine (2006) by Luke H — 13 Mar 2012

The story of the dysfunctional Hoover family who travel across America in their battered Volkswagen Camper to enter their 7-year old daughter into the Little Miss Sunshine pageant. This film redefines what it means to be a family, combining a broad range of socially awkward personalities into one tiny space to clash and collide along the way.

Olive, the daughter at the heart of the family trip to California, is arguably the only vaguely normal member, when placed alongside a failed inspirational speaker, a nihilistic teenage mute, a suicidal gay scholar, a perverted old man, and a woman who is completely oblivious to the strangeness around her.

As the Hoovers travel across the country, we see more of their personalities come into the light, but instead of seeming more dysfunctional, as would be expected, the film manages to portray them as a perfectly average American family, each with their own issues and prejudices, but who still care about one another the same as any other family.

This is shown most effectively once they reach the Little Miss Sunshine pageant itself, and become surrounded by young children who look more like packaged dolls than real children. The dysfunction that you have witnessed thus far almost pales in comparison to the shocking atmosphere of spray-tanned, airbrushed and bleach-blonde children prancing around in bikinis with lobotomised grins on their faces.

Although fantastically cheesy in its finale, Little Miss Sunshine nevertheless has an enjoyable theme of family togetherness, and a pleasant reminder that there will always be families far more messed up than your own.