Muriel's Wedding

Collette plays Muriel, a fat, awkward, sensitive dag. Living in provincial Porpoise Spit with a slug of a father, downtrodden mother and intolerable siblings, she's the butt of even her friends' jokes. Like the rest of the girls, Muriel's recurring dream is to get hitched, but hers is a fantasy of acceptance, not romance.

On a cocktail and karaoke holiday she meets fellow spirit Griffiths who persuades Muriel to escape her hellish home life and move to Sydney. Things begin to look up when a South African dreamboat proposes, even if it's just to get a passport.

Another kooky Australian movie this may be, but director Hogan and his cast sustain a strange melancholic undercurrent while Collette's portrayal of emotional enlightenment and the film's vicious observations of backwater life help lift it above mere kitsch comedy romance.