Miss Congeniality (2000)

So-so comedy directed by Donald Petrie. 

Sandra Bullock stars as an FBI agent who goes undercover as a contestant in a beauty pageant after a terrorist threatens to set off a bomb. Michael Caine plays her coach, Victor, while William Shatner is the veteran presenter, Stan. 

There are a few funny moments, but not nearly enough. As always, Bullock is brilliant but the material isn’t worthy of her talents. It’s also somewhat ambiguous in terms of its messaging about beauty contests, seeming to both condemn them and praise them. Plus, there's not enough of her as an agent.

I don't think I need to bother with the sequel.

The Sand Pebbles (1966)

China in the 1920s. Steve McQueen plays Jake Holman, an engineer on a US gunboat patrolling the Yangtze river. It’s an unusual ship in that the Americans employ a Chinese crew, who effectively do all the hard work in an uneasy master/slave relationship. 

Richard Attenborough is a sailor named Frenchy who becomes attached to a young woman he saves from a life of prostitution (Marayat Andriane as Maily). Candice Bergen is Shirley Eckert, the pretty missionary McQueen falls for. 

It’s incredibly long (over three hours), but a lot happens. It’s also the sweatiest film I’ve ever seen. Everyone seems to be perspiring all of the time. Steve McQueen is the usual monosyllabic anti-hero. He seems to struggle with what little dialogue he does have, with an oddly wobbly mouth on the sentimental scenes. 

I did wonder why The Sand Pebbles ever got made. It’s a strange story and it doesn’t have any obvious hook. Director Robert Wise had just worked on The Sound of Music, and the showdown in the missionary courtyard did partially resemble the abbey crypt scene from that superior film.