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Drop Dead Gorgeous | 1999 | PG-13 | - 4.5.6

In this mockumentary of a Minnesota teen beauty pageant, a contestant and her mother stop at nothing to ensure they win. With Kirstie Alley, Ellen Barkin, Kirsten Dunst, Denise Richards, Allison Janney, Brittany Murphy, William Sasso, Amy Adams, Dylan Bullard, Nora Dunn, Michael McShane, Shannon Nelson, Tara Redepenning, Mindy Sterling and Adam West. [1:33]

SEX/NUDITY 4 - Some sexual innuendo (including mild references to pornographic movies and orgasms) and a couple of kisses (in one scene, a boy quickly kisses another on the cheek in reaction to an announcement); we also see a couple kissing passionately in the background of a scene. A boy and girl kiss passionately, then she wraps her legs around his waist and they fall to the ground. A man tries to pull up a woman's skirt (no nudity is seen) and a girl strokes a phallic hat she's wearing. A woman stares, rather obviously, at boys wearing wrestling singlets; also, in several scenes a man watches young girls practicing for the pageant (it's implied he's very interested in them, but he vehemently denies any attraction). We see a girl in her bra and panties, photographs of a scantily clad girl, and many women and girls in cleavage-revealing tops. We see pictures of a female impersonator and a girl tells her father that her brother is gay.


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VIOLENCE/GORE 5 - In a few scenes, we see some corpses in a morgue; one of the corpses has a bullet wound on its forehead (a few lines of dried blood are visible) and another has large stitches on its chest. Two explosions kill people (nothing graphic is shown; we only see a victim's charred jacket) and another burns a woman (we see her recovering in a hospital bed with a red face and blistered burns on her arm and hand; a beer can has melted into her hand and we see it there for the rest of the movie until her hand is replaced with a hook). A girl shoots a pistol at a shooting range and a woman exchanges gunfire with police, shooting a woman in the back (the scene is more comical than dramatic). A light falls on a girl's head and she collapses; we later learn she lost her hearing and that she's happy about it. Two men slap the back of each other's heads and scuffle, and one tries to hit the other with a shovel; we also hear them hitting each other off screen. A woman pinches another's arm, a woman shoves another and girls scuffle, choke and pull each other's hair. A woman nearly hits a man with her car, a girl accidentally knocks someone down, a man runs into a plate glass window, and a girl lands crotch-first on a sawhorse she's jumping over. A woman throws stuff at a girl, grabs her shirt and then hits her in the head with a beer can. A girl reveals a scar on her stomach, apparently from a dog bite. Some verbal threats; also, a group of kids taunt a retarded man whose clothing is stuck in a car door. Lots of girls break a building's windows and tear down its marquis. We see lots of girls vomiting; we see some vomit on clothing and some on a man's beard. A woman wears a bloody butcher's apron in a television commercial.

LANGUAGE 6 - Two F-words and two F-word derivatives, lots of anatomical and scatological references, lots of mild obscenities, several insults, some name-calling, a racial slur and a profane finger gesture.

DISCUSSION TOPICS - Beauty pageants, competition, murder, small-town politics, teen pregnancy.

MESSAGE - If you don't play by the rules, you're bound to get burned; Good things happen to deserving people.

(Note: The following material does not fall within any of the regular categories but could be objectionable to some viewers: An anorexic beauty pageant winner is shown in a hospital bed, looking very weary; gobs of her hair fall out as another girl brushes it. She later performs at a pageant in a wheelchair, which is wheeled around the stage by a nurse, with an IV in her arm. A pregnant teen smokes and drinks in two scenes. On stage, a girl sings a pop song while dancing with a puppet tacked to a cross -- obviously meant to be Jesus. The Lutheran religion is implicitly mocked.)

CAVEATS

Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.

We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.

Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.


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