Her face became widely recognizable after she nearly won the crown at the Miss United States Pageant in the first film, so obviously it would be impossible for FBI Agent Gracie Hart (Sandra Bullock) to return to undercover work in the field. Obvious, that is, to all but the bumbling FBI brass, who nearly get a bunch of people killed at the outset of the sequel before realizing Gracie needs a brand new bag. So they give her a Louis Vuitton, another makeover, and make Gracie the “new face of the FBI.” And that, friends, is the harebrained hook the makers of “Miss Congeniality 2” employ to reach into your wallets and steal your hard-earned dough. Undoubtedly the funniest thing about this slapdash money-grab will be the looks on the faces of gazillions of moviegoers when they collectively realize about 30 minutes into it that they’ve been Punk’d. That must be it, because a movie this patently dull couldn’t have been the result of mere incompetence. Somebody did this to us on purpose! Still, it says here the masses will trip over themselves en route to the box office because resistance, it seems, is futile in the face of high-powered Hollywood marketing campaigns such as the one being used to launch MC2. Plus, Sandra Bullock is still America’s sweetheart.
First-flick love interest Benjamin Bratt was smart enough to avoid even a cameo appearance here, leaving Gracie to nurse a broken heart. Somehow this is supposed to explain her expeditious transformation from total tomboy to gleeful glamour girl, while opening the door for another reluctant partner, butt-kicking loose-cannon Sam Fuller (Regina King). When Miss United States (Heather Burns) is kidnapped in Vegas, Gracie and her entourage, which includes the requisite flamboyant stylist (played by the numbers by Diedrich Bader), are dispatched to the scene to work publicity. Inevitably, they all wind up working the case. Most of the ineffective attempts at humor are built upon Gracie and Sam’s quenchless thirsts for violence; swift kicks to the nuts, of course, being male-dominated Hollywood’s idea of feminist élan. There’s a chase scene through a casino involving Dolly Parton that should have been funny, but isn’t (could-n’t we have at least gotten a glimpse of Dolly running in full jiggle?). A detour to a drag-queen review yields a senses-throttling musical number involving a gaggle of Tina Turner impersonators. Treat Williams and that big goofy guy from “ER” are in the movie, too. So is William Shatner, and he may be best thing about it. Enough said. (Rated PG-13 for sex-related humor. Running time: 115 minutes)
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on March 25, 2005. Read the original PDF.