96 - Bill Maher - Christopher Hitchens

Hitchens at work. I don't agree with the majority of what he says, but wow, what a debater, and what a brilliant mind.

95 - Little Miss Sunshine

"Luck is the name losers give their own failings," says Richard Hoover (Greg Kinnear), a man who places no small importance on being number one. He has crafted his own nine step motivational success plan that he hopes will make him a star via public appearances, books, and videos. Perhaps his most noteworthy trait is his ability to ignore his own dismal failures at the game of life while zealously lecturing others on theirs; his nine step was created as much for himself as it was for the mass audience.

The members of his extended family unit all face their own life tests, which they each manage to colorfully botch. Seven year-old daughter Olive (Abigail Breslin) dreams of being a beauty queen, despite lacking the look, the talent, and the necessary disposition. Brother-in-law Frank (Steve Carell), a prominent Proust scholar (yes, I had to look up what that meant), has recently and unsuccessfully taken a razor to his wrists after his boyfriend left him for the nation’s next most prominent Proust scholar. Grandpa (Alan Arkin) splits his time between teaching Olive to dance and snorting heroin after being kicked out of his retirement community. Son Dwayne (Paul Dano) maintains a Nietzsche inspired vow of silence, which doubles as a shelter from many of his family’s squabbles, and pines for a job as a test pilot. Wife Sheryl (Toni Collette) struggles to quit smoking and keep things peaceful between everyone.

Little Miss Sunshine is a family road-trip film with an almost too bittersweet core. Every frame feels simultaneously grim and giddily upbeat, angry at the trials and tribulations of life, but happy that we get to experience them at all. This offbeat family rarely stops teetering on the edge of self-destruction, but an iron bond exists that keeps them for killing each other. I was alternating between relief and sadness that I can count my number of family members within 1000 miles with a single finger.

The axis on the film comes about 20 minutes in when the family decides to road-trip from New Mexico to California in an ancient yellow VW bus so Olive can compete in the Little Miss Sunshine pageant. They fight furiously and hilariously, with their hot tempers cooling down as much because of fatigue as because of kinship.

But when all is said and done, they are a determined bunch. When Sheryl’s attempt to learn to drive a stick-shift results in the destruction of the bus’ clutch, the family keeps the vehicle moving by giving it a running start, frantically leaping into the side door as the bus gains momentum. The bus serves as an obvious but apt metaphor for the very physics by which their unit operates.

The Hoover’s plight says a lot more than meets the eye. As with most in society, they’ve been conditioned to have lofty goals, but in their case, hard work and determination fall short. After a particularly nasty setback, Richard bravely takes the initiative to get life back on track, only to be swatted away by those who have no use for him. I won’t reveal the rest, but the variety of kooky misfortunes endured by each member highlight both their individuality and their bond.

Even as the wacky antics pass quirky and near surreal, it becomes difficult to fault the film, as the impeccable timing and rapport of the leads allow us to believe, if only temporarily, that they’ve entered a realm of desperation where rules become moot. Here exists a recognition of the torturous hell that life can be, along with people’s tenacity in refusing to just idly submit. Since all they know is failure, the Hoover’s small successes contain immense value.

The final sequence takes us to the greatly anticipated pageant, where the family’s spirits crash and unify upon witnessing the vulgar, borderline pedophiliac spectacle of scores of small girls being dolled up to sex objects for a twisted crowd. Here the Hoover’s can finally prove that they aren’t at the bottom of the ladder, after all, even if they don’t realize it themselves. While the finale may push our patience with a slightly long and formulaic conclusion, it also somehow manages to surmount the heavy-handed craziness to let us leave the theater feeling like we just witnessed a precious slice of life. And that makes this film anything other than a loser.

4 out of 5