Miss Congeniality 2

The sequel to very successful first movie featuring a klutzy, tomboy FBI agent who apparently can’t score a guy, despite being cute, smart and funny, puts the leading lady in a different position as the “face of the FBI”. She writes a book about her experiences, does the talk show circuit and dresses up. In the meantime, Ms. America is kidnapped in Vegas and our FBI agent friend, is there to check it all out. Hilarity is supposed to ensue, but excrement does instead.

First of all, I refuse to inscribe this film’s entire title at the top of this review because it’s just so fuckin’ ridiculous. LEGALLY BLONDE: RED, WHITE AND BLONDE, PRINCESS DIARIES 2: THE ROYAL ENGAGEMENT, BRIDGET JONES 2: THE EDGE OF REASON, MISS CONGENIALITY 2: ARMED AND FABULOUS—how about this, folks…how about you concentrate more on your goddamn scripts than your bullshit, long-ass titles? Yeah, that’s right…I’m pissed. I just saw two douchebag sequels in the past week (THE RING TWO is the other dung heap) and I need to vent somewhere. I just hope to God that enough of these shitstains start to tank at the box-office, so that the folks over in Hollywood decide that folks in the audience do actually have brains and won’t just keep shelling out the big bucks for rehashed sequels featuring characters that we enjoyed in the original movies, but really don’t hold up when placed in tired, unfunny, unengaging, uncharismatic, un-everything-else-you-can-think-of-that-begins-with-un follow-ups. I’ve always said that comedies are “subjective” and that most of the time, as long as you can give me a “cute story”, some engaging characters wrapped around a somewhat original script and a lead actor/actress who I like…I’m good to go. Sandra Bullock usually pulls it off for me. Yeah, I even graded the first film with a high mark because her cute/clumsiness won me over.

So what do they do in the sequel? They turn her into a character that even she hated in the first film!! A brand-name obsessed lady who cares more about looking good than anything else. Huh?? But wasn’t the whole point of our enjoyment of the first film, the fact that she was uncouth and clumsy and cute? In this film, Bullock is acting snotty and using words like “Prada” in her sentences and responding to queries about her great skin by letting us in on her secret that “catching so many felons” clears it up for her. Wow…does that pass for humor these days? Not to mention Bullock naming several famous couples from yesteryear like Burns/Gracy and adding Outkast to the end of her statement. Hardee-har-har. I think I laughed once during this entire movie, and believe you me when I say that it had nothing to do with the staple “gay man” acting as Bullock’s over-the-top coiffeur (where’s Michael Caine when you need him!), the gaggle of FBI agents – every single one of whom is a moron, a cretin or a boss-who-doesn’t-understand-the-lead-character (the great Treat Williams cashing a paycheck)—or poor Regina King acting like a complete unprofessional, aggressive beeyatch during the film’s first half, and an understanding partner during its latter turn. Yawn, yawn, yawn.

And if you thought the film’s overly-generic plotline and embarrassing points of actual drama and emotion sucked, wait until you get to its 15-minute denouement during which the sight of Bullock dressed up as a showgirl and King dressed up like Tina Turner are supposed to make you barrel over in laughter. I don’t think my face has been this stone-cold since my cat got squished by a car a few years back. Or the film’s final 2-minute tack-on scenario, which is actually kind of sweet, but belongs in a whole other movie. Wow. Sorry Sandy…even your overall cuteness, the Vegas eye-candy, my own personal movie-date, Dolly Parton’s big boobs and Bill Shatner couldn’t save this predictable, unfunny, unoriginal and most unfortunately…unentertaining motion picture from being what it truly is: yet another unambitious Hollywood fluffpiece born out of greed, sloth and safety nets. This film gets an “F” for Fuck Me! PS: Kudos to Benjamin Brattus for not signing on the dotted line for this sequel. Smart move, dude.

(c) 2021 Berge Garabedian