Year:
1999
Studio:
New Line Cinema
Movie:
3/5
DVD:
1/5
Teaser
It's the local Miss Teen Beauty Pageant at Mount Rose, Minnesota
(population of 5000-odd people). A documentary film crew is here to
record the behind the scenes. We have only eight contestants, but it's
really a two-girl race between Amber Atkins (Kirsten Dunst) -- trailer
park good girl -- and Rebecca Ann Leeman (Denise Richards) -- rich kid
with a scheming heart.
Suspicious things are going on. One possible contestant dies when her
Daddy's thresher blows up. Accidents happen, contestants drop out, and
for some reason Amber seems to lead a charmed life as the hurdles in
front of her get higher and higher. Can Amber win the pageant or will
her arch-nemesis Rebecca steal the show?
Movie
"Drop Dead Gorgeous" is a fairly funny comedy done in a mock
documentary style. The town of Mount Rose is full of idiosyncratic
characters, from the mothers -- Annette Atkins (Ellen Barkin) and
Gladys Leeman (Kirstie Alley) -- to the judges and contestants. It's
one of those movies where bad things happen to people yet you can't
help laughing at the situation.
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Actors
Kirsten Dunst is actually very good. I guess it's taken me a few movies
to realize this. When people were talking about how good she was I just
thought that it was the standard "fresh new up and comer" that never
seems to become a big star. But when I think about it more, she's
seventeen when she was filming this movie and younger in other movies.
Taking her age into account and she's remarkably good and will get much
better.
Denise Richards is beautiful and yet I keep thinking she revealed a bit
too much in interviews. That bit about her obsessive compulsive
behavior about her personal hygene is just too weird. Still, she's ok
in this movie and considering she's like 28 playing a seventeen year
old that's pretty good.
DVD
The movie is in full screen and wide screen formats. The theatrical
trailer is included and that's it. So not much. This is one of those
movies where a director's or writer's commentary would have been really
nice because as I watched the movie I kept thinking "why was this done,
why is this here?"
Recommendations
If you like Kirsten Dunst she's very good in this movie. It's a darkish
comedy that's fairly funny so I can recommend it for people who like
that sort of thing. |