A Breath of Fresh Air -- a reveiw of Little Miss Sunshine

Soon after my kids and I moved into our new apartment last month we rented Little Miss Sunshine from the $1 overnight box at Cub Foods. I wished I had caught on to this little gem before the Oscar buzz. At the time we did not have a TV, so the only place to watch a movie was huddled around my laptop. Originally, my daughter was just going to watch with me, but before my son had a chance to bury himself in a book, he was hooked on this crazy mixed up family.

Richard, the father in the family is supposedly a motivational speaker who has created a nine step plan for success. Sheryl, the mother is frenzied and serves take-out chicken for supper more often than not, but to her credit tries to supplement the meal with a salad. The older brother Dwayne, 15 and angst-ridden, had taken a vow of silence not to speak until he was accepted into a Air Force  program to fly jets. Uncle Frank, was "rescued" by the family after a failed suicide attempt. His reason? He'd fallen in love with one of the grad students in his class, and his professional rival Larry Sugarman has taken over both the affections of his student, and his position as top Proust scholar. Foul mouthed Grandpa has been kicked out of a retirement home for heroin use and is training seven year old Olive to perform in mostly local beauty pagents.

The family is in the middle of one of their frenzied wacky chicken dinners when the phone rings. The  winner of the local Little Miss Sunshine pageant is unable to attend the national competition in California. Can Olive make it? Sheryl reports that she can. Just as Olive is running around wilding screaming and yelling, "I'm Little Miss Sunshine! I'm Little Miss Sunshine!" Richard starts to explain that the family can't afford to take the cross country trip. Then he gets a call. He has a chance to pitch his "9 Steps" to someone in Albequerque. He figures he can make a pit stop on the way to California.

They head out in a subpar Volkswagon mini-bus, which inevitably breaks down. Unable to obtain the part needed to fix the bus the family makes due with what they have by pushing the bus down the road and jumping in whenever they need it to start. The face a number of other obstacles as well, but manage to find creative, budget conscious ways to manage them.

The biggest and saddest obstacle is when Grandpa dies enroute. In order to make it to the pageant the family is forced to steal his body from the hospital and keep him in the trunk of the bus. As it is, they are down to the wire and arrive at the pagaent, technically, a few minutes late. Fortunately, one of the pagaent aides lets Olive register.

As the pageant progresses, Olive seems to be more and more out of her league as she competes against the other Jon Bonet style contestants. Unlike the skinny girls in flashy clothes and too much make up, Olive walks the runway with her hair in a pontail, with oversized glasses, and her tummy sticking out a little during the swimsuit competition.

When the talent competition is about to begin her brother, father, and uncle all panic. They are afraid that Olive will embarrass herself while performing the dance that Grandpa has coached her on. The brother (who started talking again after an earlier traumatic discovery) tell his parents, "You can't let her do this." The mother leaves the choice to Olive, telling her no one would think less of her if she didn't want to go on. But apparently the only words that Olive listens to are the ones of her grandfather who had told her, "the only losers are the ones who never try." Determined, she begins her walk to the stage.

I will leave off there, because what follows is something everyone should see for themselves. And you should, because it reveals success and failure, winning and losing in a way many of us forget to see. It is not always about who crosses the finish line first, or who has the biggest trophy on the mantel. It's about taking whatever life throws at you, and making it work-- whatever way you can.