Guest picked the wrong subject ot parody.
`For Your Consideration' is, by my count, actor / director / writer Christopher Guest's fifth parody of some near-great American institution, most similar perhaps in style and target to his `A Mighty Wind', as the latter parodied American folk music while the current effort parodies American independent film making. The reviews I have seen are almost unanimous in stating that each successive effort, from the high point of `This Is Spinal Tap', has been just a bit less entertaining.

To the general consensus, I offer the opinion that a great part of Guest's problem is that he is parodying bad acting, writing, and directing, which simply comes off as bad acting, writing, and directing! I'm not sure Guest would have done any better parodying performances in a serious drama starring Meryl Streep and Nicholas Cage, let alone Ian McKellen doing Shakespeare, but I'm sure parodying C-List talent does NOT come off as A-list comedy. We even seem to lose the fun of recognizing the members of Guest's enormous repertoire company. This is a shame, since an appearance in Guest's films is easily among the highlights on the resumes of many actors, especially Eugene Levy, Michael McKean, and Fred Willard. I especially regret the weak performance of Parker Posey, who in other movies can often deliver such a wildly screwball performance it rivals some of Katherine Hepburn's non sequitor performances. One of the clearest affirmations of my hypothesis of why this film fails is the fact that I was relieved when Sandra Oh appears in a cameo role as an interviewer who is playing it straight. She may have given the best performance of the film (I'm exaggerating for sure, but that's how it feels).

Guest may suffer in part from the fact that his comedy is based almost exclusively on the effectiveness of his parody. This is similar to several of Mel Brooks' efforts, such as `Spaceballs'. It is also what raises Woody Allen's movies, even the weaker ones above the level of `mere parody'. Allen can always be counted on to include at least a half dozen good jokes which will stand on their own and get a laugh in even his weakest efforts, such as `Shadows and Fog' and `The Curse of the Jade Scorpion'.

What is worse, one never seems to connect with any of the characters. The closest I came to feeling any amount of pathos at all for any of the characters is with Harry Shearer's role as a hack actor whose main claim to fame is as a giant hot dog. Jesse White was able to achieve both success and respect as a bored Maytag repair man, but no one has any regard for a wiener in a white bread overcoat, made even more pathetic by the fact that the pork sausage was being played by a Jewish actor (or so it seemed to me). I recall forming a fair amount of connection with several of the characters in `Best in Show', and that wasn't entirely because they had dogs in tow. The worst waste was in the way the final surprise of the John Michael Higgins supporting character's winning an Oscar nomination was dropped in with no follow-on.

Another major waste may have been Bob Balaban and Michael McKean as the two screenwriters. I suspect their parodied appearance on a `Charlie Rose' lookalike show was lost on most viewers. It may have been just a tiny bit better if the interviewer had been actually played by Charlie Rose, but I wouldn't guarantee it.

This DVD has some better than average extras, especially the voice-over commentary by Guest and Levy, but the value here is diminished, because the movie gives me practically no incentive to watch the film again to listen to the commentary all the way through.

If I were to guess at least two things Guest might want to do next time is to parody something which matters to his audience (`American Idol' and Republican Party politics come to mind) and to pare down the cast a bit so we develop more of a feeling for at least some of the lead characters.

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