Some comedic ideas work better simply as ideas rather than images. The movie Drop Dead Gorgeous is filled with examples like these. The film itself is certainly funny, but I have a feeling that the script alone is much funnier. It is clear that the cast and director are trying to make the best of the material they've been given and they do their darndest to make the gags work on screen, but some ideas just don't translate. This is probably a contributing factor to the film's pace. The gags that fall flat drag the movie down, and as such it never quite picks up enough speed and starts to wear out its welcome.
Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999) is a somewhat funny mockumentary about a beauty pageant in the small town of Mount Rose, Minnesota. The chairwoman for the pageant, Gladys Leeman (Kirstie Alley), is determined to make her daughter Becky (Denise Richards) the winner, in an increasingly clear attempt to live vicariously through her daughter. Becky's biggest competitor is Amber (Kirsten Dunst), a plucky trailer park girl who works both in her high school cafeteria as well as the local funeral home and has a gift for tap dancing. Some “mysterious” deaths have been occurring to the entrants in the Mount Rose Miss Teen Princess America pageant. One girl's tractor explodes while she is driving, a stage light falls on another, and Becky's trailer becomes the victim of arson. It's fairly obvious early on that the Leemans are behind the murders, and through a series of increasingly unlikely events we watch Amber's journey to go to the national Miss Teen Princess America Pageant.
Viewers who are familiar with the culture of the upper midwest will definitely enjoy this movie more than others. I got a big kick out of hearing famous actors do their best midwestern accent, don't cha know. The best of which is Allison Janney as Amber's mentor for the pageant after Amber's mother is hospitalized in the trailer fire. The humor of this movie is in the way the town of Mount Rose is painted. A billboard at the city limits boasts “The World's Oldest Living Lutheran,” who as we find out is actually recently deceased. Throw in some references to lutefisk, some mentions about how Minneapolis is such a sinful place, a mugging Will Sasso, and the tone of the movie comes together. This movie is more than just a satire of the pageant world, it's also a satire of midwestern culture. This film suffers here mostly because it pales in comparison to the earlier Fargo by the Coen brothers.
Back to how some jokes are better as mental images rather than actual images. Amber's mother gets a beer can fused to her hand in the fire. This is a pretty funny idea, but the depiction of it on screen is a little unsettling. Another example is the reigning Mount Rose Miss Teen Princess America, who is anorexic, and arrives onstage at the pageant in a wheelchair. Another example is when, at the State competition, almost all of the contestants get food poisoning and vomit flies everywhere. These are presented as funny moments, but in reality they are painful to watch and the comedy falls flat. Don't get me wrong, I think raunchy comedy can be hilarious if done right. I thought the scene at the bridal store in Bridesmaids was hilarious. This movie does, however, have it's funny moments. The characters are all hilarious, from the slutty cheerleader, to the sign language girl, to the American girl raised by Japanese immigrants, this film is populated by bizarre people who we can't help but laugh at. It's a shame that the situations they get in aren't as funny as they are. In the end, this movie feels like it's dragging on forever. The film spends most of its time leading up to the local pageant, but then we have to see the state and then national pageants as well. Fortunately, a twist ending cuts everything short and keeps the movie below 100 minutes.
Rating: 4.5/10 - Ambivalent
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