Smile (1975, Michael Ritchie) (Patreon)

71/100

Couple of distinct films here, closely entwined though they are; I absolutely loved one of them, found the other hit-and-miss. As a procedural portrait of the Young American Miss pageant itself, focusing on its aspiring Misses, its chipper executive director, and its slumming, surly choreographer, Smile inspired nothing but grins; subtlety has never been Ritchie's strong suit, and isn't much in evidence here, but he does a superlative job of poking fun at the whole daffy enterprise in a way that almost always feels affectionate rather than cruel. That's true even when the characters turn vicious—a couple of girls are annoyed by Maria's gung-ho, bi-patriotic exuberance (she's a Tracy Flick-style keener), and sabotage her act, but the film doesn't particularly encourage us to share their implicitly racist hostility, and the prank winds up being no big deal, forgotten as soon as it happens. I laughed when one contestant, while singing "You Were Meant for Me," makes sweeping arm gestures that take her handheld mic so far from her mouth that she can no longer be heard, yet I wasn't laughing at her expense, didn't perceive her as an object of ridicule. Part of me wishes that the entire film were pageant-specific, providing richer parts for more girls; Annette O'Toole and Joan Prather—fantastic, both—eventually develop a touching friendship, but the movie doesn't realize what it potentially has in Melanie Griffith and Colleen Camp, plus who knows how many others. Though at the same time I really like that Miss Fountain Valley, who winds up winning, has made no impression whatsoever upon us prior to taking the crown. Throw in a hilariously irascible Michael Kidd as (more or less) himself, telling a stooge who worries that their relationship got off to a shaky start, "Let's keep it shaky," and I'm blissfully soaking in the lightly ridiculous atmosphere. 

Then there's the stuff that I'd call pageant-adjacent, most of which revolves to some degree around Bruce Dern's local-celeb head judge, used-car salesman Big Bob Freelander. Dern's terrific as usual, never better than when he's very gently trying to guide the girls toward success; Smile's finest moment sees Big Bob instantly look alarmed when a fellow judge (a priest) asks Robin her opinion on abortion, laugh way too hard at her feeble attempt at a joke so as to dump that hot potato down the garbage disposal, change the subject to her prowess as a flautist, and then basically feed her the answer that'll please the judges most, viz. using one's talent, whatever it may be, to make other people happy. I also sometimes enjoyed the janitors (of the building's groaning pipes: "They're fed up with swallowing Kotex. Who wouldn't be?") and got a kick out of stray details like the (invented, I'm pretty sure) Major Weenie franchise. But I could have lived without Big Bob's teenage son and his equally lame pals* trying to take photos of the girls undressing (with the big scene accompanied by "Yes Sir, That's My Baby"), and everything involving Brenda's miserable drunkard of a husband, including the Exhausted Rooster ceremony, made me wish that I were back behind the scenes at the pageant instead. (Thought the film had gone truly, horribly astray when he first threatens suicide and then shoots Brenda; thankfully, this, too, gets treated as no big deal.) A first-rate Big Bob ending would have gone a long way toward redeeming the aspects that I found mediocre, but I confess that it's unclear to me why he suddenly becomes dejected during the pageant proper. Is he just upset that his brief moment in the spotlight has come to an end (for this year)? Neither Ritchie nor Dern nor screenwriter Jerry Belson has laid the necessary groundwork for this closing bit of melancholy—indeed, the film has been assiduously papering over anything remotely serious. And then the closing credits run over a (fictively) non-consensual image of Miss Simi Valley in the nude, which as a lingering final joke does feel kinda crassly exploitative (even if Griffith, who did a full Playboy shoot with Don Johnson the following year, clearly had no more hang-ups about nudity than does their 50 Shades'in daughter). Overall, I adore much more of Smile than I abhor (don't abhor any of it, really; that's just a good rhyme)—enough to land it at #11 "on" my very competitive '75 top 10 list. But I can see an all-time favorite hiding amongst the delightfully game Young American Misses. 

* One of whom keeps making incredibly bad double entendres, a running gag that I never find funny. Not even when it's Carlos Jacott in Kicking and Screaming. Though I did chuckle here when "Wow, look at that one from Bakersfield! I got somethin' she can bake in her field" inspires Kid #2, out of focus in the background, to turn to Big Bob's son and simply say "I hate him."