Miss Firecracker

A hot tamale tries to throw off a different sort of heat in this comedy of small-town manners. Carnelle Scott (Holly Hunter) is best-known in her hometown of Yazoo City, MS, for her unrepentant promiscuity. An orphan taken in by her genteel relatives, she idolizes her older cousin, Elain Rutledge ...more

A decade before the crop of turn-of-the-millennium beauty-pageant flicks -- Drop Dead Gorgeous, Beautiful, and Miss Congeniality among them -- this hothouse flower of a comedy said most of what needs to be said about the subject, and it did so with a good deal of wit and style. Featuring the indelible comic troika of Holly Hunter, Mary Steenburgen, and Alfre Woodard, Miss Firecracker is at once a bittersweet character study, a slapstick send-up, and a lighthearted riposte to Miss America ideals. ...more