Self-Fulfilling Film

Perhaps Christopher Guest planned it this way, maybe he was making a statement about his own films and the buzz that surrounds them.

I saw “For Your Consideration” yesterday. I was not impressed. I’m positive that there would have been a few chuckles, had there been more than 5 people in the cavernous theater. Or maybe if he had stuck to his proven formula of the mockumentary, mostly improvised.
This film was not a mockumentary really, it was a straightforward film with a story, more or less. And while each one of the actors, as always, brought their unique talents of bizarre characterization to the film, it still didn’t come together. Jennifer Coolidge was the one standout, because she presented her usual ditzy blond and spouted non-sequiturs throughout; still, the cast was as good as ever. So, why didn’t the film work?
It was slow. Sparse. Not enough happened, and the extended scenes from the film-within-a-film, “Home for Purim,” really stopped the action.
I can’t help but think that this was all planned as a veiled look at Guest’s own film history; his cast that includes a few “has-beens”, his fights with writers when the script is thrown away, the highs and lows of Oscar® rumors that never come to pass despite critical acclaim.
While it may have been cathartic in some way, I can’t help but think that he would have felt even better if he’d made another film that generated some box office receipts.

Speaking of which, there has been one major change in me since I came to California. Before I moved here, I never went to a movie theater by myself. Ever. But here, I’m alone. So I see movies alone, and since I don’t have a regular 9-5 job, I give myself the afternoon off to go see a movie. I occupy the theater along with a handful of senior citizens.
Yesterday, there were five people in the audience with me. In a theater that seats at least 400, maybe more. And where did they sit? That’s right, all around me. For crying out loud, they could have sat anywhere, but they bunched up in two rows, mine and the one in front. Spread out, people!