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over 2 years ago

Miss Congeniality

a review by Filipe Manuel Neto

A good comedy, albeit with an exaggerated and unbelievable story.

This is perhaps one of the most enjoyable and endearing comedies of the 2000s. It's not a perfect film, it's far from it, but it manages to deliver on its promises and offers us an hour and a half of warm and friendly fun. It's one of those films that, while not being perfect, is ideal to watch as a family and doesn't make us waste our time.

The script has a very promising basic premise: faced with a credible threat to the security of the Miss United States of America beauty pageant, the FBI decides to infiltrate a female agent there. The problem is everything else that develops from here: the script exaggerates so much that it becomes unbelievable, even if funny. Gracie Hart, the main character, is not just an FBI agent with a tough profile and strong personality. She's basically an almost masculinized woman with the manners and demeans of a troll, who is then transformed into a model (basically) in a very, very short time! It's unbelievable and absurd. Of course, from there, the film unfolds more harmoniously, with excellent dialogues loaded with witty jokes and good material given to the actors.

Sandra Bullock is the main actress and, in this film, she achieves one of her most popular works. In addition to being excellent at what she does and giving us an impeccable job, she had the joy of playing a friendly character, worthy of the public's affection, who captures our sympathy with ease. Next to her, we can still see Michael Caine, in excellent shape and in a character full of humor. The film also has a good performance by Benjamin Bratt, Heather Burns, Candice Bergen and the participation of William Shatner.

Being a rather light humor film, it doesn't make a very strong bet on the technical aspects. Even so, I would like to leave a few notes: first of all, I believe that the special and sound effects did an excellent job throughout the film, and the same can be said of the design of the sets, costumes (with an obvious emphasis on the costumes of Bullock) and props. On the other side of the coin, I found the cinematography too uninteresting, and the editing didn't seem very inspired to me. The soundtrack does its job, highlighting almost only the song “One in a Million”, in the voice of Bosson.