Little Miss Sunshine

Little Miss Sunshine is now being said to have a good chance to win the Best Picture Oscar

I had a rather mixed opinion of the movie. It has a nice cast but the movie seemed so contrived... contrived absurdity upon absurdity, so self-conciously clever until the absurd obvious easy target end... the family was this driven to take their daughter to an event that she obviously did not belong at and they did not even know that their grandfather taught her a striptease act? and we are to honestly still care about all these characters after all this orchestrated absurdity, now that is hard to swallow.

or maybe I'm too cynical

They should've called it 'Indie Du Jour,' a recipe for successful Hollywood-Lite.

Step 1: Take 1 troubled teen/parent/child. Step 2: Mix with amusingly dysfunctional family (composed of strong ensemble cast). Step 3: Insert deadpan situations involving death, sexual taboo, vague anti-capitalism, etc. Step 4: Maintain ironic, cynical, and "smart" tone throughout. Step 5: Mix pathos and humor in roughly equal measure to both please and disquiet. Step 6: Sell completed project to major studio for wide distribution. Step 7: Rake in loads of money while still trying to maintain your "indie" street cred.

Hey, it worked for Thumbsucker, Junebug, and so many others. Oh, did I mention I enjoyed it?

Couple of really funny moments,the family dancing at the end,but up for best picture? They must be short of films to pick from this year. Worth a watch,but no means a classic.

The Departed on the other hand,if it doesn't win Best Picture & Best Director then they obviously have it in for Martin Scorsce.

Children of Men is a stunning film, visually brilliant, oppressively dark and disturbing... not an easy film, my favorite of the past year even thou i had trouble understanding the accents in the indie film theatre soundsystem

His Holiness, The Pope wrote: They should've called it 'Indie Du Jour,' a recipe for successful Hollywood-Lite.

Step 1: Take 1 troubled teen/parent/child. Step 2: Mix with amusingly dysfunctional family (composed of strong ensemble cast). Step 3: Insert deadpan situations involving death, sexual taboo, vague anti-capitalism, etc. Step 4: Maintain ironic, cynical, and "smart" tone throughout. Step 5: Mix pathos and humor in roughly equal measure to both please and disquiet. Step 6: Sell completed project to major studio for wide distribution. Step 7: Rake in loads of money while still trying to maintain your "indie" street cred.

Right on the money. Getting tired of these movies. They try to be clever, but are so readable its anything but clever.