Beautiful (2000)

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Admirable film.

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

Beautiful (2000): Dir: Sally Field / Cast: Minnie Driver, Hallie Kate Eisenberg, Joey Lauren Adams, Kathleen Turner, Leslie Stefanson: Brain dead embarrassment supposedly representing change of character. Minnie Driver plays a spoiled brat who dreams of becoming Miss America. She gets pregnant and Joey Lauren Adams raises the child. Pitiful situations arrive such as Driver assisting a woman in labor. She announces constantly that she is Miss Illonois while wheeling her out in a shopping cart. Adams is a care giver arrested when a patient overdoses on pills but freed with no explanation as to how she was found innocent. Early hints of incest are also never addressed. Horrible directing by Sally Field who probably should stay in front of the camera where she is at her best, in films better than this one. Driver is embarrassing in pretty much every scene and that is saying something considering the level of talent she has demonstrated in other films. Hallie Kate Eisenberg goes through the motions as her daughter. Adams isn't exactly giving a Chasing Amy performance here especially since her role is very loosely written and handled. Kathleen Turner is an unfortunate waste. Leslie Stefanson plays a fellow idiot contestant. While it examines various aspects of beauty pageants it can never avoid becoming something that is anything but beautiful. Score: 2 / 10

Admittedly, this film was not one that should have expected to have a big audience...which is probably why it lost so much money. The first niche audience it had was that it was a woman's movie...but I'm not sure even most women would buy into this film. Nevertheless, I (as a man) liked it, although it is a tad bit depressing.The most basic thing this movie is about is -- people who can't.The main character is played by Minnie Driver. She is a young woman who has been aiming to win a national beauty pageant since she was a child. Unfortunately, she couldn't win those child pageants because she couldn't compete with girls who were naturally beautiful, had supportive parents, and a sense of taste. The first part of the film is the character as a cjild, but then Minnie Driver plays the young woman. Driver is good here, although what she's good at is playing a character who is totally self-absorbed and totally selfish.Joey Lauren Adams plays the best friend, who is totally supportive, going so far as to adopt Driver's illegitimate child so she can still compete in the "miss" contests. I'm not familiar with her from other films, but she's quite good here, and plays a character who can't defend herself when she is accused of killing a nursing home patient she cares for.Hallie Eisenberg plays the illegitimate daughter. What a natural! The supporting actors do well here, including Kathleen Turner. Turner plays a former beauty contestant who couldn't compete, but now trains children to become beauty contestants. The mother of Driver in the film plays the mother who can't...successfully raise a child.So, this is a movie about those who can't. The question is, will Driver's character grow up and develop some substance? Of course, we know the answer, but what's very solid about this film is that it doesn't come easy. Admittedly, the ending is a bit unrealistic. But it works, and makes the statement Sally Field (director) apparently wanted to make.Is it a great film? No. But it has substance to it, and, there are those who will agree that it's well worth watching.

BEAUTIFUL (2000) * Minnie Driver, Joey Lauren Adams, Hallie Kate Eisenberg, Leslie Stefanson, Bridgette L. Wilson, Kathleen Turner, Ali Landry, Michael McKean. (Dir: Sally Field) I wish I could say something nice about Sally Field's big screen directorial debut but through no fault of her own (except accepting this god-awful comedy/drama to do just that) the film is a complete disaster.Mona (Driver, who co-produced with her sister Kate) is a white trash young woman desperately attempting to achieve her life-long desire of becoming a beauty contestant winner of the Miss America pageant and spends the entire length of her life (and the film) in doggedly determined to do just that.Unfortunately during her quest she gets pregnant and for reasons never fully explained (except the given that she is extremely selfish) has the child raised by her long-suffering best friend, Ruby (Adams), a nurse in an old folks' home, who stands by Mona through thick and thin. Gradually little Vanessa (Eisenberg, the moppet from those Pepsi commercials), begins to put two and two together and when Ruby is suddenly thrown in jail (for murder! Yes the plotting is ridiculous; seems one of her charges was saving up on her daily meds and finally overdosed unbeknownst to Ruby) Mona is faced with her greatest challenge: facing her daughter.The film has not one shred of grace or subtlety. For example, with Vanessa as her new hurdle to overcome, what does Mona do. Get a lawyer, get a job, feed the tyke? No. She gets a camera and has the girl take candids of her for the upcoming big event and in one of the many cringe worthy moments finds herself assisting a pregnant woman's delivery in a supermarket, singing 'Wind Beneath My Wings' (!) The tone of the character is so mean-spirited that ultimately you don't care one iota if she succeeds in becoming a winner (she is so obsessed with this that nothing else matters in her life) and I actually loathed her for her displays of self-absorption and greed.It was sickening and by the film's outrageous conclusion that Mona sees the errors of her way totally rings false and feels superfluous to the rest of the film.Field, who obviously is one of our most talented actresses, should deserve better projects and one can only hope she will. As for Driver, another equally gifted actress, she had better get it into her head that there is no audience for a character that has no scruples, heart or affection for another character. If this was meant to be a black comedy then it completely misses the mark altogether.

I caught this movie the other day and I was pleasantly surprised! I will watch just about anything Minnie Driver does because, in addition to being REALLY easy on the eyes, she is also a very talented performer.In this film, Driver plays a Beauty Pageant conetstent that is driven (no pun intended) to win at all costs, even to the extent of lying about her own life and actively sabotaging the other contestants. It is difficult to talk about this film without giving away some of the surprises, so I will just have to say that this movie is entertaining even if it does end up ultimately being a "chick flick", and it might make you think about priorities in your life. 6/10