| 75 |
San Francisco Chronicle
A mannerless, styleless brute, Bullock's Grace Hart is Eliza Doolittle in sweats.
|
| 70 |
Los Angeles Times
A mainstream Hollywood escapist fantasy that in the end melts satire into sentimentality, but it is funny and knowing, detached enough to take a bemused stance toward its calculated tone.
|
| 67 |
Austin Chronicle
A remarkably solid, streamlined, action-comedy in the ugly-duckling-to-gorgeous-swan genre that elicits more laughs and genuinely affecting moments than you might expect from its tepid ad campaign.
|
| 63 |
Boston Globe
She (Bullock) has a way of landing on her feet and remaining simpatico no matter how cheesy the script is. That's what happens here.
|
| 63 |
New York Daily News
Miss Congeniality would not be out of place as a TV series, so it makes sense that Candice Bergen and William Shatner appear as pageant co-hosts.
|
| 63 |
Philadelphia Inquirer
The makeover from ugly duckling to swan essentially replaces narrative catharsis.
|
| 50 |
Film.com
It all coalesces in a TV-level pleasantness, which isn't quite enough to fill a big screen.
|
| 50 |
Chicago Sun-Times
It isn't bad so much as it lacks any ambition to be more than it so obviously is.
|
| 50 |
New York Post
Has some entertaining moments, thanks mainly to Bullock herself, who is surprisingly glamorous as well as endearing.
|
| 50 |
Mr. Showbiz
A barrage of dangling plot strands, inconsistent characterizations, and suspense-free shootouts.
|
| 50 |
TV Guide
William Shatner's comic timing helps him nearly steal the picture.
|
| 50 |
USA Today
It is a measure of the movie's lack of inspiration that William Shatner is the funniest thing in it.
|
| 50 |
Miami Herald
The players are game. Too bad they don't have much of a coach or a plan.
|
| 50 |
Portland Oregonian
Bullock maintains a luster and comic naturalness that most actresses couldn't pull off in such mediocrity.
|
| 40 |
Variety
Stumbling its way down the comedy runway, Miss Congeniality is yet another miscalculated vehicle for the ever-feisty Sandra Bullock.
|
| 40 |
The New York Times
Supporting performances add comic spark to a movie that otherwise seems happily, deliberately second-rate.
|
| 38 |
Charlotte Observer
As lame as a three-legged mule.
|
| 30 |
Chicago Reader
The kind of ugly-duckling role that's long been ironic for her (Bullock).
|
| 20 |
Washington Post
The jokes are lame, the set-up is stupid and Bullock, occasionally a winsome comedienne and here a co-producer, is annoying as heck.
|
| 20 |
Rolling Stone
I'd rather be buried in a mound of Floridian chad than watch director Donald Petrie force Bullock to jump through another desperately unfunny comic hoop.
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