Smile (1975 film)

Smile is a 1975 DeLuxe Color satirical comedy-drama film directed by Michael Ritchie with a screenplay by Jerry Belson about a beauty pageant in Santa Rosa, California.

Smile
Original theatrical poster by John Alvin
Directed byMichael Ritchie
Produced byMichael Ritchie
Screenplay byJerry Belson
Starring
Music byDan Orsborn
CinematographyConrad L. Hall
Edited byRichard A. Harris
Distributed byUnited Artists
Release date
  • July 9, 1975 (1975-07-09)
Running time
117 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

It stars Bruce Dern and Barbara Feldon and introduced a number of young actresses who later went on to larger roles, such as Melanie Griffith. The film satirizes small-town America and its peculiarities, hypocrisies and artifice within and around the pageant.

The film was subsequently adapted into a 1986 Broadway musical with songs by Marvin Hamlisch and Howard Ashman.

Plot

The plot revolves around the contestants and people involved with the California pageant of the fictional Young American Miss Pageant, held in Santa Rosa, California.

Big Bob Freelander, the head judge, is a used car dealer. Brenda DiCarlo is the pageant's Executive Director, and her husband Andy is a resentful alcoholic.

In separate subplots, the film focuses on Andy's unhappiness, as he is about to be inducted into a fraternal society, which requires a humiliating ritual, Little Bob, Big Bob's son, who conspires with his friends to photograph the contestants in various states of undress, and the activities of the contestants themselves.

Wilson Shears, the pageant producer, clashes with a choreographer brought in from Hollywood, Tommy French, who is cynical and blunt.

Andy refuses to go along with the induction ceremony, which involves kissing the behind of a dead chicken. Brenda discovers him at home, apparently about to commit suicide with a gun. She tries to talk him out of it, and he decides she is the real problem and shoots her, wounding her. He is jailed, but she refuses to press charges and Andy is released. Big Bob tries to convince him to not move from town.

The show becomes more expensive than was anticipated, and Shears pressures French to remove a ramp, because it is taking up seating. This results in an injury to a contestant, and French agrees to reinstate the ramp and to make up the difference out of his fee.

The pageant concludes successfully, though the contestants that have been the focus of the film's attention do not win.

Cast

Production

Smile was filmed on location in and around Santa Rosa, with the pageant held at Veteran's Memorial Auditorium.

Reception

Smile was well received upon release, with praise for the humour, satire and performances. Vincent Canby of The New York Times called the film a "pungent surprise, a rollicking satire that misses few of the obvious targets, but without dehumanizing the victims It's an especially American kind of social comedy in the way that great good humor sometimes is used to reveal unpleasant facts instead of burying them."[1] Roger Ebert of The Chicago Sun-Times gave the film 3 out of 4 stars, saying that though "Ritchie has so many targets that he misses some and never quite gets back to others," the film still "does a good job of working over the hypocrisy and sexism of a typical beauty pageant."[2]

In 2014, Indiewire listed Smile as one of the "ten great overlooked films from the 1970s." Indiewire said the film was "overlooked even within Ritchie’s canon: a gentle, occasionally caustic but mostly warm satire." Indiewire called the performances "uniformly top-notch," and said "Subsequent beauty-pageant movies like Drop Dead Gorgeous and Little Miss Sunshine have tended to feel like pale imitations next to it.[3]

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 100% based on reviews from 14 critics, with an average rating of 7.57/10.[4]

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See also

References
  1. Vincent Canby (9 October 1975). "'Smile,' a Film Satire on Having Fun". The New York Times. Retrieved 1 June 2016.
  2. Roger Ebert (1 January 1975). "Smile". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
  3. "10 Great Overlooked Films From The 1970s". IndieWire. 2014-04-24. Retrieved 2019-11-01.
  4. "Smile (1975)". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango Media. 1 January 1975. Retrieved 9 September 2019.
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