Miss Firecracker

A much under-rated movie: both a satire on the sheer awfulness of small-town pageants, and a poignant yet ultimately hopeful romance about talented misfits coming to terms with their nature. A minor criticism is that it suffers from the usual movie cliche: characters who are supposed to be plain - in this case, Holly Hunter and Alfre Woodard - who are the most charismatic people in the movie. Highlight: the amazing dance routine by Hunter. I'm an old cynic, but the ending was both iconoclastic and beautifully feelgood.

It's hard to find anything wrong with this film. It was cleverly written and beautifully acted. When you're watching the actors and don't think to yourself, "that's Alfre Woodard, Tim Robbins, Holly Hunter or Mary Steenburgen," then they are doing their job! Being a southerner I could tell immediately that the writer knows what she's doing, too. I loved each and every single character. The scenes move together seamlessly and by the end, you've felt Carnelle's pain, Elaine's dissatisfaction with life, Popeye's endless hope, Delmont's search for peace and Mac Sam's empty existence. Would that I could write and direct a film of this subtle magnitude one day.

Carnelle Scott (Holly Hunter) enters the title contest in her town of Yazoo City, Mississippi staged every Fourth of July in the hope of winning like her cousin Elaine (Mary Steenburgen) did two years ago. Carnelle was raised by her cousin and she has less grace than an elephant in a crystal shop, but still hopeful to win. One day her weird cousin Delmont (Tim Robbins) is released from the mental hospital and hopes to sell their house for making money: Carnelle sees this as an incentive for winning the contest and escape her small town life. Carnelle doesn't win the contest because Elain lies to her about the delay of the dress and she comes with a older dress. She is frustrated, but not for long because she understands that the contest isn't everything.

I liked Holly Hunter's performance as a woman determined to win the title contest, but the most memorable role is that of Tim Robbins' as the looney cousin that doesn't think too straight. There were some funny moments and the ending makes you think. So, while not exactly a comedy, it's still intelligent and original... certainly a reason enough to rediscover it on YouTube since it's very obscure.

"Physiognomy": the act of judging people by their physical appearance.

As in her first film, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Crimes of the Heart, Beth Henley has created a collection of off-beat Southern Gothic characters. These characters seem familiar like old friends (or more like black-sheep cousins), ut the film goes beyond its representation of these endearing characters to explore deeper themes, to ask whether appearances are really important.

The Miss Firecracker Contest, is superficially, a comedy about a small town Southern beauty pageant, in which Henley reflects in a sardonic manner on how and why women put themselves through such contests. The pageant, however, merely frames the action. The play is ultimately about appearances. Henley introduces the idea that women shape their identities and bodies in terms of the opinions of other people, and the more important issue of breaking away from stereotypes in order to discover your personality. The beauty pageant is even held on the Fourth of July -- Independence Day.

All of the women in this play, except Popeye, define themselves in relation to the contest. Staying with Henley's successful formula of an insecure heroine who searches for acceptance from society and her family, The Miss Firecracker Contest is dominated by the beauty queen "wannabe," Carnelle Scott (a role created on stage by then little-known Southern actress Holly Hunter). Carnelle is not merely competing for the crown; she wants to win the contest so that she can win acceptance from the town of Brookhaven, Mississippi, shed her tawdry reputation, and leave the town in a "crimson blaze of glory." Carnelle's own name even expresses her sexual nature -- the derivation of her name, "carnal," means pleasures of a sexual nature.

Her cousin and idol, Elain, is a self-absorbed former pageant winner -- a Scarlett O'Hara for the twentieth century -- still living off the glory of her youth. Even Tessy Mahoney, one of the two ugliest girls in town, takes pleasure in the authority of the whistle and clipboard she wields as pageant coordinator. Of the women, only Popeye -- with her coke-bottle glasses -- is more concerned with "seeing" than with being seen. An admirer of beauty that transcends physical appearance, she serves as a mirror through which others may see their own self-worth.

The Miss Firecracker Contest continues Beth Henley's examination of the South -- and especially of small-town Southern women. In pursuing this theme, she is following in the steps of earlier Southern playwrights, such as Lillian Hellman and Tennessee Williams. And like Southern author William Faulkner with his fictitious county of Yoknapatawpha, Mississippi, Henley appears to be establishing a physical universe and a cast of familiar characters for her canon of plays.

Carnelle has lived in Yazoo City, Mississippi in her aunt and uncle's house since she was orphaned as a child. She grew up with her cousins Delmount (Tim Robbins) and Elain (Mary Steenburgen).

Delmount comes home from a mental institution and wants to sell the family home. Elain comes home from Atlanta where she has her own problems. Elain won the Miss Firecracker beauty pageant years ago. Carnelle decides to enter the pageant in her last official year with regards to her age.

Alfre Woodard played Popeye Wilson, a seamstress, who has a crush on Delmount. The film is rich in character development and this film should be shown around the Fourth of July summertime. Ann Wedgeworth played a pageant coordinator. The film was done in 1989 after an off-Broadway play of the same name. The film is heartwarming about really winning. Carnelle wanted to redeem herself and reputation.