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Flimsy FOR
YOUR CONSIDERATION: Directed by Christopher Guest. Script
and original music by Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy. Starring Ed
Begley, Jr., Eugene Levy, Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, Catherine
O'Hara, Parker Posey and Harry Shearer. Warner Independent Pictures,
2006. PG-13. 86 minutes. I'd like to suggest Movieness as an alternate title to For Your Consideration. The new satire of Hollywood by Christopher Guest and friends, For Your Consideration radiates movieness, meaning it's keenly aware of the film industry it so earnestly tries to lampoon. What it doesn't contain is funniness. For Your Consideration is a flimsy, filmsy mockumentary that too often misses the mark.
The Christopher Guest formula is by now widely familiar. Take a self-contained world of highly teasable enthusiasts — small town actors, say, or dog breeders — insert several dimwits and has-beens, introduce overwhelming disappointment, and present it as a documentary. Even Guest's weakest effort — 2003's A Mighty Wind, about a reunion of highly sensitive folk musicians — ultimately works because the concept is a precious escape from Hollywood filmmaking. Watching a Christopher Guest film is like watching early Woody Allen: There's a sense of discovery, of wanting to keep these stories to yourself. You marvel at how these movies ever got made. Now, turning to Hollywood as a subject, Guest seems overmatched. For Your Consideration is the story of the making of Home for Purim, a 1940s Hebrew "period picture" destined to go unnoticed during awards season. As you might expect, the film-within-a-film is awful. Not to be confused with Home for Punim ("Home for a Face"), the movie consists largely of a dad (Harry Shearer) and his son (Christopher Moynihan) waiting for the prodigal daughter to return. When the daughter (Parker Posey) finally comes home, she arrives with her female lover (Rachael Harris), much to the disappointment of her dying mother (Catherine O'Hara). The early scenes, in which the cast and crew of Purim attempt to defend or assert their pathetic selves, are isolated and only inconsistently funny. As with all of Guest's characters, they are much, much further from glory than they realize. Delusions of grandeur are always at play in Guest's films, but in For Your Consideration they take center stage. When a rumor appears on the internet that Home for Purim might be Oscar-worthy, the entire production gets swept up in the hype. For a little while, the laughs come steadily. The mock interview with producer Whitney (Jennifer Coolidge) reveals an archetype of dumb blonde vanity. The joint interview with the screenwriters Lane (Michael McKean) and Philip (Bob Balaban) shows their grasp of Purim to be tentative at best. Let's not forget Fred Willard as the co-host of Entertainment Tonight clone Hollywood Now (with the remarkable Jane Lynch doing a perfect Mary Hart spoof). Willard's breezy portrayal of an idiotic entertainment reporter, complete with faux Mohawk and outrageous costumes, will rank among his best. The film peaks in a hilarious sit-down meeting between the studio executives and the writing/production team. The message from Sunfish Studios is, "Tone down some of the themes a little." In other words, make the film less Jewish. A long argument with overlapping dialogue ensues. The centerpiece of the film, the scene reveals much of what's wrong with Hollywood today: It's cowardly, prejudiced and afraid of actual culture. After a jump-cut several months into the future, we learn that Purim is now called Home for Thanksgiving. The suits won. The film loses. The disorienting lurch breaks the fragile rhythm of For Your Consideration. More importantly, given how Guest usually exults in the tiny details of human failure, the harsh break feels like an ironic comeuppance, as if an actual studio stepped in and said, "Time to wrap this up." Hollywood gets the better of Guest here, in easily the most Hollywood of his movies. Let's hope the next time we see Guest and company, the material is more worthy of the concept. |
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