Miss Congeniality (2000)

Gracie Hart is a bit of a tomboy and dedicated FBI agent. When a terrorist threatens to bomb the Miss USA beauty pageant the FBI decide to send an agent undercover to protect the entrants and uncover the terrorist. However, agents capable of entering the contest are far and few between and the initial favourite turns out to be on maternity leave.

Thanks to the wonders of an FBI imaging computer Gracie Hart is uncovered as the perfect contestant but her present looks are hardly ideal for the competition. They decide to hire a beauty consultant, who with his work cut-out, has two days to work wonders on Gracie and turn her from an ugly duckling to beauty queen capable of fitting into the competition whilst the FBI hunt for the terrorist.

The picture is bright with some superb colour tones and detail, although it can suffer from some excessive contrast at times. It has an above average bit-rate throughout the film an exhibits no signs of artifacting, outlining or picture noise.

The sound is average with the occasional, but effective, use of the surround channels along with some good stereo steerage in the front channels. The dialogue is audible at all times and remains impressively fixed in the centre throughout the film.

Warner seems to have adopted a rather poor menu system for their DVDs. Whilst the main menu is scored it remains a rather boring static affair and we certainly expect more, especially if you consider the award winning The Matrix disc. The extras are reasonable enough with a couple of documentaries which have been split, unnecessarily, into two to pad out the disc.

However, it is the excellent audio commentary which goes to prove just how much fun Sandra Bullock truly is. Just how many major stars go back to the studio to record an enthusiastic audio commentary? Listening to her incessant ramblings is worth the price of the disc alone and she obviously enjoyed both her time on set and producing the audio commentary.

Michael Caine is a hoot as the stylist and together with William Shatner they really take the mickey out of themselves, and surly doing no harm to their careers in the process. Speaking of careers, the cast and filmmakers profiles is worth a look as Michael Caine needs his own disc just to list his film appearances. What a career he has had!

Although the film is pretty much a predictable affair from start to finish it is still full of great one liners to keep you chuckling. If your a fan of Sandra Bullock then you won't be disappointed.