Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999)

Director:

Michael Patrick Jann

Writer (WGA):

Lona Williams (written by)

Release Date:

23 July 1999 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy

Tagline:

The battle between the good and the bad is bound to get ugly.

Plot:

In a small Minnesota town, the annual beauty pageant is being covered by a TV crew. Former winner Gladys...

Plot Keywords:

Beauty Pageant | Corruption | Fake Documentary | Miss America Song Spoof | Mental Retardation

Awards:

1 win & 1 nomination

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Kirsten Dunst	...	Amber Atkins
Ellen Barkin	...	Annette Atkins
Allison Janney	...	Loretta
Denise Richards	...	Rebecca 'Becky' Ann Leeman
Kirstie Alley	...	Gladys Leeman
Sam McMurray	...	Lester Leeman
Mindy Sterling	...	Iris Clark
Brittany Murphy	...	Lisa Swenson
Amy Adams	...	Leslie Miller
Laurie A. Sinclair	...	Michelle Johnson (as Laurie Sinclair)
Shannon Nelson	...	Tess Weinhaus
Tara Redepenning	...	Molly Howard
Sarah Stewart	...	Jenelle Betz
Alexandra Holden	...	Mary Johanson
Brooke Elise Bushman	...	Tammy Curry

Also Known As:

Dairy Queens (USA) (working title)
Gnadenlos schön (Germany)

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for irreverent and crude humor, sex-related material and language.

Runtime:

97 min

Country:

USA | Germany

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital | SDDS

Certification:

Finland:K-11 | Argentina:13 | Iceland:L | South Korea:15 | Netherlands:6 (re-rating) | Australia:M | Canada:14A | France:U | Germany:12 | Ireland:15 | Netherlands:12 | Portugal:M/12 | Switzerland:12 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:12 (canton of Vaud) | UK:15 | USA:PG-13 | Singapore:PG

Filming Locations:

Ardmore Village, Lakeville, Minnesota, USA

Company:

New Line Cinema

Trivia:

Screenwriter Lona Williams was herself a contestant in local beauty pageants. She appears in the film as the pageant's third, non-speaking judge, Jean.

Goofs:

Continuity: During the opening number of the pageant, Michelle Johnson (Laurie Sinclair) is wearing a "Hollywood" hat; near the end, she can be seen standing behind Amber Adkins (Kirsten Dunst) with no hat at all.

Quotes:

Loretta: Are we on 'Cops' again?

Movie Connections:

References "Cops" (1989)

Soundtrack:

Fanfare For The Common Man

Who says satire is dead?

This is a seriously funny film, deeply subversive and a great piece of work. What it's not is a satire on the vacuousness of beauty pageants.

DDG aims at the emptiness of our whole materialistic culture and the way we have traded in the more valuable things in life for the pursuit of a perfect self image and will even cash in that perverted, limited objective for a few minutes of fame on TV. Life is a house of cards with hidden truths under every shiny surface.

The humour is so dense and the jokes are so profligately thrown around that it occasionally feels like an incarnation of The Simpsons, 54 episodes of which benefited from the efforts of DDG scriptwriter Lona Williams. She may have written your favourite. The performances are no less praiseworthy with outstanding leads and fabulous and memorable minor characters. Look out for the Sheriff. Amongst them all, I'll single out two which I think are pitch perfect, Sam McMurray as the ruthless father in thrall to his wife and daughter and Nora Dunn as the drunken 'has it come to this?' State Pageant organiser. There are lots of others to choose from.

Every you time you watch you get something new, enabling you to rejoice further in the fact that half the people who watch it don't get any of it at all. In fact it's so sharp that even people who like this type of thing can get cut to pieces by it. We are, after all, watching ourselves. Mind your fingers . . .

Most smartest and funniest American film since The Producers. Yes, it's THAT good.