The director of Pretty Old was going for something pretty remarkable with his documentary about a senior citizen beauty pageant. Unfortunately, by rarely exploring the more significant aspects of what he captured and sticking to the more cliché human interest stories, he's made a pretty disappointing film.
Walter Matteson brings his camera crew to Fall River, Massachusetts, to document the 30th anniversary of the Ms. Senior Sweetheart Pageant. Of course, many of the competitors are beautiful, vibrant, fascinating women. But Matteson wants to be fair and try to give each competitor her moment in the spotlight. While that's awfully nice, it doesn't make for a particularly gripping documentary. The most we ever get to know about these women is the litany of diseases either they or their husbands suffer from.
That's a real shame, because there have to be more interesting stories in there, stories of heartache and triumph, that we don't get to see, because the film goes right to the most obvious ploys for sentimentality. One competitor has late-stage cancer, another's husband has Alzheimer's. Truly, these are emotional stories, but the film sometimes feels inauthentic, especially because we're cutting between tearful confessions and poorly sung renditions of standards. It's as if the movie is not a celebration of these women but rather a carefully constructed attempt to make you cry.
Another reason it's hard to care quite so much is that these women don't seem to bond or have much in common. That's a big difference between this and a similar documentary that pulled it off beautifully. That would be Young@Heart, about a senior-citizen glee club. That film will absolutely wreck you. But Young@Heart earns it while Pretty Old orchestrates it.
The film, while often a delightful time with some great ladies, fails to explore more pressing issues, which are mentioned but never emphasized. The biggest is that this pageant, unlike so many for young women, not only has competitors but winners of all shapes and sizes. There's opportunity for pointed commentary against the rail-thin, long-haired, big-chested ideal of beauty our culture has fed us for so long, but Pretty Old doesn't go there. It also avoids the racial impact of this pageant, especially significant to black women, now in their 70s and 80s, who had to endure all manner of scorn, disdain and even abuse for much of their lives. A win wouldn't even begin to make up for what they had to endure, but it sure would be meaningful to them.
Pretty Old had lots of potential, but for a film supposedly about real beauty, it's frustratingly skin-deep.
