X
- 1975
- PG
- United Artists
- 1 h 53 m
- 1975
- PG
- United Artists
- 1 h 53 m
Summary A social comedy about a beauty pageant for young Californian women, held annually in Santa Rosa, and how it affects the locals and participants.
Directed By: Michael Ritchie
Written By: Jerry Belson
- 1975
- PG
- United Artists
- 1 h 53 m
- 1975
- PG
- United Artists
- 1 h 53 m
Smile
79
User Score
Available after 4 ratings
tbd
Summary A social comedy about a beauty pageant for young Californian women, held annually in Santa Rosa, and how it affects the locals and participants.
Directed By: Michael Ritchie
Written By: Jerry Belson
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 11 Critic Reviews
79
100% Positive
11 Reviews
11 Reviews
0% Mixed
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 11 Critic Reviews
79
100% Positive
11 Reviews
11 Reviews
0% Mixed
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Managing to be cynical and heartwarming at the same time, this is an almost perfect satire on the American Institution of beauty pageants.
Smarter and funnier than the recent theatrical release, "Drop Dead Gorgeous," Michael Ritchie's superficially similar beauty-contest satire was mostly ignored when it came out in 1975. It has since become a classic, and a high point in the careers of Bruce Dern, Annette O'Toole, Barbara Feldon, Michael Kidd and Melanie Griffith. [05 Aug 1999]
The film feels like the midpoint of Robert Altman and Hal Ashby, and perhaps one of the reasons it’s been overlooked is that it arrived the same year as two similar masterpieces from those directors, in “Nashville” and “Shampoo,” and if this isn’t quite as flawless as those films (it’s admittedly somewhat sprawling and unfocused), it’s nevertheless worth a watch for many reasons.
This 1975 satire about a “Young American Miss” beauty pageant and the middle-class mentality of small-town southern California is Michael Ritchie’s best feature, though it hasn’t won anything like the reputation it deserves.
Ritchie has so messy targets that he misses some and never quite gets back to others. But Smile does a good job of working over the hypocrisy and sexism of a typical beauty pageant.
It's an especially American kind of social comedy in the way that great good humor sometimes is used to reveal unpleasant facts instead of burying them.
User Reviews
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Production Company
Tamalpais Productions,
David V. Picker Productions,
Twin Roads Productions
Release Date May 10, 1975
Duration 1 h 53 m
Rating PG
Genres
Tagline Raised on hamburgers and soda pop, She's got a winning smile that's hard to top. A credit to her family, the ideal teen, She's all America's daughter, she's a beauty queen.
Awards
Writers Guild of America, USA
• 1 Nomination
