Little Miss Sunshine (2006)

Michael Arndt's screenplay for the stellar comedy Little Miss Sunshine is tightly constructed, and full of the kinds of characters talented actors kill to portray. All of the characters and themes are economically but patiently set up in a funny 20-minute dinner sequence that opens the movie. Throughout the film, characters perform what seem to be throwaway actions that actually pay off later in the film. The fact that first-time directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris know when to keep the story moving and when to slow down for the first-rate character stuff helps make it one of the great debuts of the year. However, it is the actors who make Little Miss Sunshine one of the best films of 2006. These characters, from the suicidal Proust scholar to the heroin-addicted grandfather to the silent, sullen teenager to the failed motivational speaker (a comedy concept worthy of an award in and of itself), could all be played so grandly that the film would collapse. However, everybody stays on the same page emotionally, making them seem like a real family and like real individuals. About a third of the way into Little Miss Sunshine, Steve Carell and Alan Arkin play a simple scene in which Arkin's character makes a frank request that gets a laugh from Carell's character. The scene is unusual because very rarely does anyone actually laugh onscreen in a comedy. Carell's laugh feels utterly genuine and entirely in character, making the conversation one of the moments that best exemplifies the humanism and the humor in the thoroughly entertaining Little Miss Sunshine. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide