FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION 2006lecinemadreams.blogspot.com/2013/08/for-your-consideration-2006.html

Although I like to think of myself as having a good sense of humor, I’m afraid I’m not what you might call an “easylaugher.” (My partner would beg to differ. Given my fondness for Peter Sellers, Benny Hill, and particularly DonAdams; I think he ranks my funnybone somewhere in the “easily-amused, lowbrow laugh-whore” zone.)

But be that as it may, I just don’t happen to find many motion picture comedies to be particularly funny. This isespecially true of contemporary comedies, a great many of which seem little more than 5-minute skits painfullydragged out to feature-film length. My face turns to stone at just the mention of the names Adam Sandler, KevinJames, Tim Allen, Rob Schneider, or Vince Vaughn; each of whose films (of which I’ve mercifully experienced but asmattering) feels like an eternity spent in the frathouse kegger from hell.Looking over my DVD collection, I note that a preponderance of what I consider to be my favorite comedies areactually of the unintentional variety: Showgirls, Mommie Dearest, The Oscar, The Poseidon Adventure. But alsorepresented are the '70s comedies of Mel Brooks; Peter Bogdanovich’s What’s Up, Doc? and Paper Moon; thecounterculture black comedies of John Waters and Paul Morrissey/Andy Warhol; and, although I haven’t foundWoody Allen to be particularly funny since Manhattan Murder Mystery and Bullets over Broadway, I can’t deny that Iown virtually all of his early, Diane Keaton-era films.

Jane Lynch and Fred Willard do a terrifyingly spot-on send-up of those vapidlycheerful, vacant-eyed hosts we've all seen on Hollywood news magazine

programs like Entertainment Tonight and Access Hollywood .

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These days, I find television to be the most satisfying and consistent source of comedy. Or, more accurately, thewhole TV/Internet/DVD connection. From the brilliant The Larry Sanders Show to Arrested Development, LisaKudrow’s Web Therapy and The Comeback, Parks & Recreation, Ricky Gervais’ The Office and Extras, and LouisC.K.’s Louie…the comedy stuff being made for television nowadays (owing, perhaps, to the briefer format) is headand shoulders above what’s being done in film.The sole exceptions to the above-stated criticism leveled at motion pictures are the (all-too infrequent) ensemblecomedies of Christopher Guest, Eugene Levy & Co. This is Spinal Tap, Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show, AMighty Wind, and my personal favorite, For Your Consideration, rank, in my estimation, among the best Americancomedies ever made.

Catherine O'Hara as Marilyn Hack: 32-year veteran actress

Harry Shearer as Victor Allan Miller: 40-years in the business, still works for scale

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Eugene Levy as Morley Orfkin: Worst Agent in the World

Parker Posey as Callie Webb: " I don't act for trophies."

Christopher Guest as Jay Berman: Alleged Film Director

Ascribable perhaps to its departure from the usual “mockumentary” format they’re known for, For Your Considerationis regarded by some devotees of the Guest/Levy films to be one of their weaker efforts. For me, it's the totalopposite. While I wouldn't go so far as to insist any of these films is better than the other (each manages to beuproarious in its own unique way), I can say that due to its satirical targets being topics near and dear to my heart(movies, Hollywood, The Academy Awards, fame culture), For Your Consideration is the film I relate to the most. Iget all the inside jokes, I understand the characters, I recognize the absurd world depicted. For Your

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Consideration achieves the impossible in creating a flawless and riotously funny satire of an industry thatincreasingly teeters on the brink of becoming a satire of itself.

John Michael Higgins as Corey Taft (alias Jo-Jo): Movie Publicist

For Your Consideration tells the story of what happens when three otherwise rational actors in an inconsequentiallittle independent film allow themselves to get swept up in the frenzy surrounding the self-propigating hype of theAcademy Awards. Following Christopher Guest’s usual mode of commenting on the large by focusing on the small;Hollywood and the film industry is savagely lampooned when we're allowed behind the scenes in the making ofHome for Purim— a by-all-appearances dreadful family drama (think Lifetime or Hallmark Channel caliber) in thesouthern gothic tradition of Eugene O’Neill. Minus the talent. The amusingly overwrought Home for Purim chronicles the domestic travails surrounding a family reunion in thePisher household in 1940s Georgia (pisher being Yiddish slang for just what it sounds like…pisser). From its teamof hack writers, dedicated cast of never-quite-made-its, and barely-up-to-the-task production crew, Home for Purimis journeyman filmmaking in every department. But because it's an independent feature, cast and crew indulgethemselves in the delusion that what they are making is art.Once The Academy starts knocking, principles and pretensions are put to the test. In depicting the many (hilarious)ways in which Hollywood types are willing to quickly sell out when fame and fortune comes calling makes For YourConsideration a laugh-a-minute look at a world where high-flown pretensions of “art”commingle uneasily withstandard-operational workday mediocrity.

Bob Balaban (I love that guy) as Phillip Koontz (not Kuntz) and Michael McKeanas Lane Iverson.

The conjointly-disregarded writers of Home for Purim

As was the case with the delusional regional theater thespians of Waiting for Guffman, For Your Consideration4/9

mines its (occasionally poignant) comedy from the big-time dreams and ambitions of the talent-challenged. But sinceit takes place in Hollywood, the absurdity ante is considerably upped, because, as we all know, being absolutelyterrible at one’s job has never been an obstacle to success in the movie business. Hope springs eternal in anindustry where individuals of no discernible talent (Kristen Stewart, Vin Diesel) can rake in the millions, or trulyabominable, full-on crap directors like Michael Bay and Dennis Dugan (IMDB him, if you dare) never cease to beemployed.

Wake Up, L.A.!For Your Consideration's television spoofs are so off-the-chart deranged, they

don't look like spoofs at all.

For Your Consideration shows what happens when career actors for whom working in the movies has always meantearning a living and not being on the A-List, are given a last-gasp shot at a ride on the red carpet of fame.WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THIS FILMHollywood satires are as old as the industry itself (the 1937 Leslie Howard comedy Stand-In is a good example).But too often they’re either kid-gloved jabs at the easy targets of greed, egomania, and artifice (i.e., Jerry Lewis’ ThePatsy, Walter Matthau’s Movers and Shakers, Mel Brooks’ Silent Movie, Singin’ in the Rain); or embittered, not-very-funny, revenge-fueled vendettas by tarnished Golden Boys no longer at the top of the heap (Blake Edwards’ S.O.B.,Joe Eszterhas’ Burn, Hollywood, Burn). The flaw of the former is the toothlessness of the satire; the flaw of the latter:the convenient way the filmmakers tend to posit their onscreen surrogates as the principled victims of a morallycorrupt industry (an industry you sense they'd sell their mother for to get a chance to again be a major player in).

Jennifer Coolidge as producer Whitney Taylor Brown & Jordan Black asproduction assistant Lincoln.

Not a functioning brain cell between them.

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In the end, the biggest lie of these satires is their being rooted in the questionable notion that somehow the movieindustry is this monolith of empty values and avarice operating independently of the individuals it employs. If themovie industry is creepy, it's because of the Brett Ratners and Charlie Sheens it attracts, not its profit-basedcorporate structure.

Where For Your Consideration shines (and why I find it so hilarious) is that it presents Hollywood as an industry thatis only as empty-headed and superficial as the people who seek to make their living in it. The humor comes out ofthe character flaws of individuals who willingly subject themselves to its rejections and petty humiliations; whodelude and flatter themselves that they are absolutely NOT a part of the system; and who, pitiably, are so fueled bylonging and vulnerable to temptation that they readily sell out every last principle and ideal they have when anopportunity for fame and fortune presents itself.

For Your Consideration finds both the humor and humanity in people of unexceptional gifts harboring the dream ofbeing extraordinary.

There's not a movie made that couldn't be made better with the casting of ParkerPosey.

Rachael Harris as Debbie Gilchrest: "Dying is easy, playing a lesbian is hard!"

PERFORMANCESAs is always the case with Christopher Guest’s ensemble comedies, the entire cast is absolutely brilliant, making itimpossible to point out one favored bit without leaving out a dozen more. Suffice it to say there’s not a singlecharacter in the film I wouldn't have enjoyed seeing more of. Even after multiple viewings, I keep catching new bitsof business and finding more layers in the marvelously comic characterizations. They are all just great.

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Ensemble members Rachael Harris, Ed-Begley, Jim-Pidddock, and Deborah-Theaker

Of course, special mention must be made of Catherine O’Hara, who just shines as Marilyn Hack. Her performancehere is doubly notable because it inspired real life to imitate art (O'Hara garnered considerable Academy buzz forthe film. A buzz that never materialized in an Oscar nod). There’s no way that I can watch her sympathetic portrayal of an actress who so humiliatingly loses her grip at thethought of being nominated for an Oscar without thinking of Sally Kirkland. For those unfamiliar with the name, SallyKirkland is an actress who’d been appearing in films since the 60s without making much of an impact when, in 1987,a Best Actress Oscar nomination for Anna, thrust her into the limelight. And she ran with it.

Serious Actress Movie StarCatherine O'Hara's transformation from dedicated professional to potential

Oscar-nominee is nothing short of chilling in perfectly capturing that"perpetually startled" look of the face-lift set. Amazingly, there are no special

makeup effects involved. She's just using her facial muscles!

Determined to reverse decades of obscurity, Kirkland (who in Anna beautifully portrayed an unglamorous, middle-aged stage actress) launched herself into an exhaustive campaign of self-promotion memorable for itsshamelessness. Almost unrecognizably glammed-out, wearing perilously short skirts that enhanced her always-on-display, recently-enhanced breasts; the 46-year-old veteran actress carried on like a giggly starlet on a string ofnighttime talk shows—most frequently The Arsenio Hall Show. A sad coda to her tale is while she continues to workin films, her Oscar nomination never did result in stardom. In addition, Kirkland suffered so many serious healthissues as a result of her breast implants that she had to have them removed and later became an advocate for thebanning of the surgical procedure.

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Don Lake & Michael Hitchcock as the squabbling Siskel/Ebert-like TV film critics

THE STUFF OF FANTASYA few of my favorite bits of dialogue.

Victor Allen Miller: "It’s just a bit silly about the Oscar stuff, don’t you think?"Sandy Lane : Silly? It’s the Backbone of this industry!"Victor Allen Miller: "An industry noted for not having a backbone."

Corey Taft: “In every actor there lives a tiger, a pig, an ass, and a nightingale. You never know which one’s going toshow up.”Simon Whitset (cameraman): "Do you know how tight my aperture is right now? Have you any idea?”Jay Berman (director): “If you’re being a smart-ass, you know what I'm gonna do? I’m gonna put you across myknee.”

Variety HeadlinesPointing Guy Scores Big / "Let's Shoot The Puppy" Gets Axed: Studio Pulls Plug

Lane Iverson: “You can't throw the baby out with the bathwater because then all you have is a wet, critically injuredbaby. And I don’t think that’s what you want to put your name on.”

Debbie Gilchrest: "I feel like it's ambiguous. I don't think it's clear that I'm gay. I mean, I got the look, but I think thatwe're pussyfooting around the subject."Brian Chubb: "That made you sound gay..."

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Sandra Oh & Richard Kind as the marketing directors for Home For Purim

THE STUFF OF DREAMSChristopher Guest and Eugene Levy make comedies about dreamers, and as such, their humor always has a touchof wistfulness to it. Being a huge film fan and a dreamer myself, perhaps that's why For Your Consideration is myfavorite of their films. Or maybe it's just that I get a kick out of a movie that takes a bit of the air out of the kind ofpeople who go around saying things like: "It's all about the work," "It's important to hone one's craft," or refer to theirvoices and bodies as "My instrument."

Copyright © Ken Anderson

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