Starring
Toni Collette, Greg Kinnear, Steve Carroll
Directed by
Jonathan Dayton,
Valerie Faris
Rated
15
Out now
What's the story?
Toni Collette plays a blinder as 'woman on the edge of a nervous breakdown', backed up by Greg Kinnear as the hapless husband and Steve Carroll as suicidal brother Frank - but it's Alan Alda as foul-mouthed, class-A-addled gramps who steals the show.
Take one seriously malfunctioning family; the morose teen who's taken a vow of silence, fraught dad on the edge of bankruptcy, gay uncle coping with a failed suicide attempt, wannabe seven-year-old beauty queen, heroin-shooting granddad - and a mum at her wits end, (well, wouldn't you be?). Put them in one on-its-last-legs VW van and send them across America for a kiddie beauty pageant they are in danger of missing. Sound formulaic? Quirky characters take to the road and discover family togetherness, group healing and the power of dreams that really do come through?
Best bit?
This is one film that turns the formula on its head, challenges the preconceptions and subverts the stereotypes. It's a feel good movie that won't want to make you barf, a laugh out loud comedy that ditches the smaltz.
Will I get bored?
You'll love it if you have even half a brain cell that's crying out to be taken seriously in sea of lightweight comedy drivel. Because dreams sometimes don't come true.
www.foxsearchlight.com/littlemisssunshine/
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