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Miss Congeniality... |
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Movie
Review: Miss Congeniality
Cast: Sandra Bullock, Benjamin Bratt, Michael Caine, Candice Bergen,
William Shatner, Heather Burns.
Directed: Donald Petrie.
Written: Marc Lawrence and Katie Ford |
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Schlumpy FBI agent with bad posture and bad attitude
infiltrates a big beauty pageant and turns into a swan. Story and direction are useless,
the script is dysfunctional, but Sandra Bullock saves the day.
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MAYBE it's the season. Maybe our immune system is misfiring.
Maybe hell is freezing over. Whatever the factors, "Miss Congeniality" is
adorable.
There's no concrete reason for anyone to come to this conclusion. The direction, by Donald
("My Favorite Martian") Petrie, is all but nonexistent.The veteran Hugh Wilson
reportedly backed out of the project somewhere along the way.) The script is what you
might call lumpy, with a few really smart jokes bobbing up among the mush. The story,
about an ( ugly duckling FBI agent |
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transformed when she infiltrates a beauty
pageant-romance! self-confidence! the ability to walk in heels!-makes you wonder if chimps
really are running the studios.
And costar Benjamin Bratt, as the inevitable colleague who sees our heroine's worth only
when she puts on eyeliner and falsies, is irritatingly shallow-but, then, so was every
other actor who's played the same, ever-recurring role.
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No, "Miss Congeniality" is almost entirely about
its star, Sandra Bullock, whose agent Gracie Hart attempts to redeem herself and her
career by going under cover at the Miss United States beauty pageant. The pageant, which
has received a threat linked to the same serial bomber who has been terrorizing the rest
of the country, has plenty of other problems, including an obsessive director (Candice
Bergen), a washed-up host (William Shatner, who has morphed into Merv Griffin) and a late
entry (re)named Gracie Lou Freebush, Miss New Jersey and |
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undercover agent.
Bullock, who has a producer credit on the film, is not really a physical comedienne. The
scenes in which the wobbly Gracie gets tutored in the pageant arts by the very queenly Vic
Melling (the always reliable Michael Caine) |
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contain no more comic grace than the rest of the film. But
when Bullock-or Caine-deliver some of the script's better lines, the result is hilarity.
When Bullock goes through the waxing, plucking, tweezing and teasing of Pageantland, the
good humor is contagious.
Bullock is just plain funny, but she gets a lot of help (and a run for her money) |
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from Heather Burns, who plays the
ditsy, virginal Miss Rhode Island and becomes Gracie's pal during the prelude to the
pageant. Yes, it's cheap to steal good lines from movies, but here's one, from Miss Rhode
Island's onstage interview: "What's your definition of the perfect date?"
"Oh, I guess I'd have to say April 25..." OK, maybe we're coming down with
something. But charm isn't something you can really explain anyway.
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