My Fair FBI Agent
Miss Congeniality passes muster. Bullock plays a Brainiac FBI agent who whose people skills and personal grooming habits are Job None. Movie opens with Russian gangsters taken down and Bullock's character's FUBAR. Course when you pick a villian, it has to be from a country too poor to piss and moan over being made the heavy. Russia is now the new fave for this auspicious task. ("Eef you do not stop using Ruskies as villians, ve vill boycott your movies!" "Oooooooo, we're scared copyright violators."
Circumstances are set up that an agent has to be planted in the Miss United States pageant. And of course it's Bullock, the thoroughly disheveled agent for whom "comb" is a foreign word, who comes to the rescue. So she get the makeover and the sow's ear has turned into one helluva silk purse. That brings her to the attention of fellow FBI agent, Benjamin Bratt, who brings his Law & Order character to the movie. Since he's gone from drama to comedy, you'd think he'd've allowed for the diffs in the role. Nope.
Michael Caine is stuck with the Gay Man Who Whips Pageant Contestants Into Winners role. At least he knows he's acting in a comedy and lets loose with bile-tipped hilarious one-liners. Candice Bergen plays a former Miss United States winner who now runs the pageant. William Shatner is her partner in this cultural abomination.
Miss Congeniality is Bullock's show and the woman is absolutely terrific. She acts. She has to play a part and does so, which is way more than a lot of overpaid "actors" do for their role-playing. If I had my way, Bullock would get an Academy Award nom for this work. But since comedy roles get the short end of the stick, such as Joan Cusack and the fantastic job she did in In & Out, I wouldn't hold my breath. (Besides, I'd have to say Julia Roberts has a lock on the award thanks to her work in Erin Brockovich .)
Having touted Bullock's work, you'd think the movie must be one laugh riot after another. Well, no. It's funny, but not that funny. Since this is a "realistic" comedy, they have to toe a fine line between outrageousness and actuality. It's a line that I don't believe any writer could hit and please the majority of the movie-goers, so we have to let it pass.
Meanwhile, the other actors have to spew their lines and other tban Michael Caine, no one has anything to brag about. Especially Mr. Fish Out Of Water, Benjamin Bratt.
Bottom line, if you're a Bullock fan, this is your movie. Other people should go if they want a competent comedy fix.
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