Back to trending
Drop Dead Gorgeous

Drop Dead Gorgeous

Comedy · 1999

In a small Minnesota town, the annual beauty pageant is being covered by a TV crew. Former winner Gladys Leeman wants to make sure her daughter follows in her footsteps; explosions, falling lights, and trailer fires prove that. As the Leemans are the richest family in town, the police are pretty relaxed about it all. Despite everything, main rival (but sweet) Amber Atkins won't give up without a fight.

Movie details

Drop Dead Gorgeous

“The battle between the good and the bad is about to get ugly.”

1999 Comedy 1h 38m

Critical arithmetic

The consensus, allegedly.

IMDb

6.7 / 10

42.1K votes

Rotten Tomatoes

47 %

Tomatometer

Metacritic

28 / 100

Metascore

TMDB

6.5 / 10

Community rating

External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.

In a small Minnesota town, the annual beauty pageant is being covered by a TV crew. Former winner Gladys Leeman wants to make sure her daughter follows in her footsteps; explosions, falling lights, and trailer fires prove that. As the Leemans are the richest family in town, the police are pretty relaxed about it all. Despite everything, main rival (but sweet) Amber Atkins won't give up without a fight.

CriticWise case file

What this film says about your taste.

Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.

The archetype split

Who fights over Drop Dead Gorgeous?

The split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.

Taste neighbourhood

Nearby on the taste map.

TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.

The Mouse That Roared

The Mouse That Roared

Comedy · 1959

The Duchy of Grand Fenwick decides that the only way to get out of their economic woes is to declare war on the United States, lose and accept foreign aid. They send an invasion force (in chain mail, armed with bows and arrows) to New York and they arrive during a nuclear drill that has cleared the streets.

Real Life

Real Life

Comedy · 1979

A pushy, narcissistic filmmaker persuades a Phoenix family to let him and his crew film their everyday lives, in the manner of the ground-breaking PBS series "An American Family".

Duplex

Duplex

Comedy · 2003

When a young couple buys their dream home, they have no idea what the sweet little old lady upstairs is going to put them through!

Smile

Smile

Comedy · 1975

It's time again for California's "Young American Miss" beauty pageant, the biggest event of the year for Big Bob Freelander and Brenda DiCarlo, who give their all to put on a successful pageant. But Brenda is having marital difficulties and Bob's son is up to some mischief. Could this year's pageant be in jeopardy?

Legally Blonde

Legally Blonde

Comedy · 2001

Fashionable sorority queen Elle Woods has it all, but, she wants nothing more than to be Mrs. Warner Huntington III. But he dumps her before heading to Harvard Law School. Elle rallies all of her resources and gets into Harvard, determined to win him back. While there, she figures out that there is more to herself than just good looks.

Butter

Butter

Comedy · 2012

An adopted girl discovers her talent for butter carving and finds herself pitted against an ambitious local woman in their Iowa town's annual contest.

Dumb and Dumber

Dumb and Dumber

Comedy · 1994

Lloyd and Harry are two men whose stupidity is really indescribable. When Mary, a beautiful woman, loses an important suitcase with money before she leaves for Aspen, the two friends (who have found the suitcase) decide to return it to her. After some "adventures" they finally get to Aspen where, using the lost money they live it up and fight for Mary's heart.

Mean Girls

Mean Girls

Comedy · 2024

New student Cady Heron is welcomed into the top of the social food chain by the elite group of popular girls called ‘The Plastics,’ ruled by the conniving queen bee Regina George and her minions Gretchen and Karen. However, when Cady makes the major misstep of falling for Regina’s ex-boyfriend Aaron Samuels, she finds herself prey in Regina’s crosshairs. As Cady sets to take down the group’s apex predator with the help of her outcast friends Janis and Damian, she must learn how to stay true to herself while navigating the most cutthroat jungle of all: high school.

Trading Mom

Trading Mom

Comedy · 1994

The Martin kids learn of a magic spell that will take them to the 'mommy market' so they can get a more user friendly model. After giving a few other moms a try, they want their own back. But that is not so easy.

Addams Family Values

Addams Family Values

Comedy · 1993

Siblings Wednesday and Pugsley Addams will stop at nothing to get rid of Pubert, the new baby boy adored by parents Gomez and Morticia. Things go from bad to worse when the new "black widow" nanny, Debbie Jellinsky, launches her plan to add Fester to her collection of dead husbands.

Where it lives

Watch in your region.

Cinema release signals and current streaming, rental, and purchase options for your region.

Streaming availability data supplied by JustWatch.

Names above the title

The people responsible.

Directed by

Michael Patrick Jann

Written by

Lona Williams

Kirsten Dunst

Kirsten Dunst

Amber Atkins

Ellen Barkin

Ellen Barkin

Annette Atkins

Denise Richards

Denise Richards

Rebecca Ann 'Becky' Leeman

Kirstie Alley

Kirstie Alley

Gladys Leeman

Allison Janney

Allison Janney

Loretta

Sam McMurray

Sam McMurray

Lester Leeman

Mindy Sterling

Mindy Sterling

Iris Clark

Court is in session

Put Drop Dead Gorgeous on trial.

Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.

The defence The Popcorn Loyalist

“It owes the canon nothing.”

The movie pursues immediacy and audience pleasure without begging institutions to certify its worth.

The prosecution The Big-Idea Head

“Easy pleasure, short half-life.”

It moves efficiently through the moment but offers little reason to keep arguing once the credits end.