Little Miss Sunshine (2006)
Average Rating: 7.7/10
Reviews Counted: 206
Fresh: 187 | Rotten: 19
What happens when you stuff a failed motivation speaker, his wife, the nation's number one Proust scholar, an elderly potty-mouthed heroin addict, a teen who's mute by choice, and a bespectacled little pageant hopeful into a mini VW bus for a three day road trip? You get this hilarious but moving satire about a dysfunctional family obsessed with winning. Credit must go to the ensemble cast that includes Greg Kinnear, Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Alan Arkin, and Abigail Breslin and the delightfully funny script by Michael Arndt, which first-time directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris handled perfectly.
Average Rating: 7.3/10
Critic Reviews: 49
Fresh: 43 | Rotten: 6
What happens when you stuff a failed motivation speaker, his wife, the nation's number one Proust scholar, an elderly potty-mouthed heroin addict, a teen who's mute by choice, and a bespectacled little pageant hopeful into a mini VW bus for a three day road trip? You get this hilarious but moving satire about a dysfunctional family obsessed with winning. Credit must go to the ensemble cast that includes Greg Kinnear, Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Alan Arkin, and Abigail Breslin and the delightfully funny script by Michael Arndt, which first-time directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris handled perfectly.
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Average Rating: 4/5
User Ratings: 379,546
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Movie Info
When a pudgy, bespectacled seven-year-old, Olive (Abigail Breslin), voices her desire to take home the coveted Little Miss Sunshine crown at an upcoming beauty pageant, her wildly dysfunctional family sets out on an interstate road trip to ensure her a clear shot at realizing her dreams in former music video directorial team Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris' quirky feature debut, starring Greg Kinnear, Steve Carell, and Toni Collette. Despite early career success as an outspoken motivational
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Cast
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Greg Kinnear
Richard -
Toni Collette
Sheryl -
Steve Carell
Frank -
Paul Dano
Dwayne -
Abigail Breslin
Olive -
Alan Arkin
Grandpa -
Marc Turtletaub
Doctor #1 -
Jill Talley
Cindy -
Brenda Canela
Diner Waitress -
Julio Oscar Mechoso
Mechanic -
Chuck Loring
Convenience Store Propi... -
Justin Shilton
Josh -
Gordon Thomson
Larry Sugarman -
Steven Christopher Parker
Teen Boy #1 -
Bryan Cranston
Stan Grossman -
John Walcutt
Doctor #2 -
Paula Newsome
Linda -
Dean Norris
State Trooper McCleary -
Beth Grant
Pageant Official Jenkin... -
Wallace Langham
Kirby -
Lauren Shiohama
Miss California -
Mary Lynn Rajskub
Pageant Assistant Pam -
Jerry Giles
Funeral Home Worker -
Geoff Meed
Biker Dad -
Matt Winston
Pageant MC -
Joan Scheckel
Judge -
Casandra Ashe
Girl in Hallway -
Melvin Rodriguez
Officer Martinez -
Alexandria Alaman
Pageant Contestant -
Brittany Baird
Pageant Contestant -
Brenae Bandy
Pageant Contestant -
Maliah Hudson
Pageant Contestant -
Lindsey Jordan
Pageant Contestant -
Annabelle Roberts
Pageant Contestant -
Nicole Stoehr
Pageant Contestant -
Alissa Anderegg
Pageant Contestant -
Cambria Baird
Pageant Contestant -
Kristen Holaas
Pageant Contestant -
Destry Jacobs
Pageant Contestant -
Shane Murphy
Pageant Contestant -
Sydni Stevenson-Love
Pageant Contestant -
Lauren Yee
Pageant Contestant
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Little Miss Sunshine Trailer & Photos
All Critics (207) | Top Critics (49) | Fresh (192) | Rotten (22) | DVD (34)
All indie-movie families may start out unhappy in their own way, but by the time the final credits roll, everyone remains complacent, confident of their brood's superiority.
Sunny or dark, comedy should never be as predictable as Little Miss Sunshine.
... a scrappy human comedy that takes an honest path to laughs and is twice as funny and touching for it.
... this isn't much more than a glorified sitcom, but it deftly dramatizes our conflicting desires for individuality and an audience to applaud it.
For a movie generated from the Amerindie algorithm of family dysfunction, road-trip catharsis and studied quirk, this dark-edged ensemble comedy often borders on the loveable.
Top CriticHilarious, profane and as much fun as you are going to have in a theater this summer.
Fox Searchlight loads the standard DVD with impressive features, including audio commentary tracks that are fun and entertaining, alternate endings and a music video.
While the screenplay is impressive and deserving of its recognition, it is Alan Arkin's performance-of-a-lifetime that separates this from other well-written small movies.
Harmless enough as passable road movies go, but I can't help but wish directors of films like these would grow some damn balls.
Sundance-calibrated sitcom
I loved it, every bit of it.
Like little kids spouting dirty words in certain comedies, this film from first-time directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris undermines the subversive with the self-conscious. But it's still funny.
...mediocre black comedy.
This inspirational, hilariously sad dysfunctional-family-road-trip dramedy offers absolutely everything -- except pretension.
In a word: amazing.
A few touching and surprising moments aside, it all feels a little prefab, with family dysfunction as the indie version of a high concept.
Writer Michael Arndt has cleverly captured the bribery and corruption which lie at the heart of most families.
The chaotic dinner scene pops like syncopated jazz, setting the tone for a warm, funny film that has more smiles than belly laughs.
Accumulates depth and fleshes out its characters.
Charming, moving, warm and brilliantly hysterical, Little Miss Sunshine is easily the funniest thing I have seen in a theater in years.
A cheap Sisyphean metaphor literally drives the thing: at first played for laughs, it's recycled to the point of nausea.
Ride along to dysfunction in quirky indie comedy.
A hilariously caustic package that makes its ultimate uplift genuinely feel-good instead of insufferably saccharine.
Audience Reviews for Little Miss Sunshine
Super Reviewer
Super Reviewer
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- Grandpa: Losers are people who are so afraid of not winning, they don't even try.
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- Pageant Official Jenkins: [outraged at Olive's talent act] What is your daughter doing?
- Richard: She's kickin' ass, that's what she's doing.
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- Sheryl: What happened?
- Richard: I'll tell you when I regain consciousness.
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- Dwayne: You know what? Fuck beauty contests. Life is one fucking beauty contest after another. You know, school, then college, then work, fuck that. And fuck the air force academy. If I wanna fly, I'll find a way to fly. You do what you love, and fuck the rest.
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- Officer Martinez: Ok, you're out. On the condition that you never enter your daughter in a beauty pageant in the state of California ever again. Ever.
- Frank: I think we can live with that.
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- Biker Dad: YA! ALRIGHT!
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Latest News on Little Miss Sunshine
February 1, 2012:
Five Favorite Films with Daniel Radcliffe"It's actually a thrill to be talking about something else," Daniel Radcliffe chuckles, pausing to...
October 28, 2011:
Five Favorite Films with Abigail BreslinSince her acting debut in Signs (at age six) and Oscar nomination for Little Miss Sunshine (at age...
March 17, 2009:
Five Favourite Films with Greg KinnearHow do you describe the career of a guy who started as the host of Talk Soup on E! and within five...
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Foreign Titles
- Pequeña Miss Sunshine (ES)
