FILM DISCUSSION: LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE
1. Task: write a new entry on your blog: choose one topic of discussion (question) and write a comment using the tags and the quotes from the film (see the grid below and the questions as prompts).
2. Tweet a sentence to summarise your comment and include the link to your blog's entry. Add hashtag #misssunshinebastida
Little
Miss Sunshine
Topics
for Class Discussion
1. There is a saying in English that “Beauty is only skin deep.” How does this expression apply to Little Miss Sunshine?
2. How do the relationships among members of the Hoover family change from the beginning to the end of the movie?
3. Are people divided into winners and losers in Catalonia? If so, how?
4. The two children in the family are named Olive and Dwayne. These names are very unfashionable in America; they are “loser” names. Why do you think they were given loser names in the movie?
5. In America, older people like grandpa in the movie often go into retirement homes where they live with other retired people and apart from their families. How does this compare with the way older people are treated in Catalonia? What are some of the advantages and disadvantages of putting elderly people in retirement homes?
6. Dwayne says that life is just one beauty contest after another, “you know, school, then college, then work”, they are all just kinds of beauty contests. What do you think?
7. Frank quotes Proust when he said that the best years of his life were the years he suffered because they made him who he was.
What do you think? Can suffering be a good thing?
ADAPTED FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES FROM: https://tustclass2010.wikispaces.com/file/view/Little+Miss+Sunshine+Discussion+Packet.pdf
BRAINSTORMING PROMPTS:
QUESTION NUMBER + TOPIC
|
TAGS
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QUOTES
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1 and 6 (beauty)
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diet pills, ice cream, beauty contest/pageant
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«Am I pretty?»; «You're beautiful inside and
outside»;
«Everyone is gonna laugh at her»; «We've got to let
Olive be Olive»
|
2 (family relationships)
|
Fucking chicken, vow of silence.
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«I'll be driving the van!»; «I'm proud of you»,
«thank you, Dad»;
«No, no! We're going to California»;
«Everybody, just pretend to be normal».
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3 and 4 (winner-losers)
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Losers, winners, 9-steps program (refuse-to-lose
program)
|
«Olive, uncle Frank gave up»;
«I don't want to
be a loser. Dad hates losers»;
«Do you think you can win?»;
«Don't apologise, it's a sign of weakness»
|
5 (elderly people)
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Sunset manor, paradise
|
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7 (life suffering)
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Proust, uncle, Dwayne, vow of silence
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«High-school? You don't get better suffering than
that!»;
«Proust says: if you save all the suffering in life, you
don't learn a thing»
|