Little Miss Sunshine (2006)

It is a story of a seven year old, Olive, who wanted to take home the popular Little Miss Sunshine crown at an upcoming beauty pageant event. Then the journey begins when Olive and with her dysfunctional, yet somehow supportive family, as they traveled the road going to California to reach the girl’s dream. Along the road, they have come across many challenges and trials that their family was experiencing. It’s a kind of a road trip about hope and despair on life that you’ll surely enjoy in some different ways.

Mise-en-scene

“Mise-en-scene”, literally means “put in scene”.  In films, it refers to almost everything that goes into the composition of the shot, includes actors, lighting, décor, props, costume. In other words, mise-en-scène describes the stuff in the frame and the way it is shown and arranged.  I’ll be describing the film through the four general areas: location, lighting, costume, staging and acting. 

Location

Location is an essential element of the film. It creates both a sense of place and a mood and it may also reflect a character’s emotional state of mind. In the following image, from Little Miss Sunshine, it’s somewhat like a silent field along the road where Dwayne run into and breakdown. It’s because he discovered that all this time he is color blind and realizes that this wrecks his dream of becoming a test pilot. Here you can see, her sister Olive comforts him with a hug as the character conveys despair about he learned.   

The next shot, it’s a scene where they were sent at the Hotel’s security office, where a police officer tells them they are free to leave as long as Olive never enters a beauty pageant in the state of California again. In the image, the family’s expression is some kind of dismayed, upset and traumatized about what just happened in their entire trip.

Lighting

Lighting is one of the film elements that have the greatest power to evoke emotions. In this picture, it’s the scene wherein Olive was already on the stage together with other candidates for the Little Miss Sunshine beauty pageant. High key lighting was present in this scene which is often seen in comedies and musicals. Here you can see bright lights that were used for the stage design with different kinds of dazzling colors.

Costume

The most easily noticeable aspect of mise-en-scene is costume. The obvious purpose of costuming is to dress an actor according to his character. The main characters wear at least two costumes in this film. In the image, the youngest who is Olive, wears red t-shirt with a pink dinosaur print, pink printed shorts, red boots, with a ponytailed hair and matching accessories like wrist bands and huge eyeglasses. It’s just an ordinary look for a nerdy, yet bubbly and cheerful kid.

Besides that, the following characters such like Olive’s father, Richard, wearing polo shirt, belted pair of jeans, and with a rubber shoes. Then Olive’s mother, Sheryl, wears a blue-green sleeveless top, midi floral skirt, and closed shoes. Next, Sheryl’s brother, Frank, wearing long-sleeve polo, white jeans, brown shoes, with beard on his face and bandage on his wrists. Then Olive’s brother, Dwayne, just a white shirt, pair of black jeans and vans shoes. Lastly, the grandpa, Edwin, wears a white plain shirt with leather vest, denim jeans, gladiator sandals, with a bag in his waist. This created the sense of character that a typical kind of family will look like.

Staging and Acting

It is the actor’s duty to bring his or her character to life within the framework of the story. Their emotional effort dictates how strongly the audience feels about the film. In this scene where grandpa, Edwin, tells Olive that she is the most beautiful girl in the whole word was the most touching scene for me. The lines that have been used in this scene were brilliant, like when grandpa told Olive that, “A real Loser is somebody that’s so afraid of winning. They don’t even try”. He delivered each line with conviction that was enough for the audience to feel the emotions.

The meaningful arrangement of the actors on the set is called blocking. As shown in the image, the father, Richard, and grandpa, Edwin was in the both side of the table as they are the heads of the family and of course next to Richard is his wife, Cheryl, and follows their children, Olive and Dwayne and then Frank sits besides grandpa.