Filmmaker Christopher Guest goes back to the target area of his very first film, The Big Picture -- namely the movie biz, more narrowly the Oscar buzz -- and back before he chained himself to the mockumentary format, Waiting for Guffman, Best in Show, A Mighty Wind. Any sense of liberation therefrom has not spilled over into comic invention. The behind-the-scenes satire is sufficiently old-hat that there must be a lot of truth in it, even if not a lot of laughs in it. And the parodies of on-screen Hollywood, both big budget and small, are so far outside the realm of possibility as to spare everyone's feelings, moviegoer's included. Guest is more on the mark with the assorted inanities of the P.R. game -- the studio publicist, the "infotainment" industry, the talk-show circuit. And Catherine O'Hara, among his stable of repertory players (Harry Shearer, Eugene Levy, Michael McKean, Parker Posey, Fred Willard, Jane Lynch, et al.), stands out as an over-the-hill actress who, try though she mightily might, cannot hide her vanity and her ego. Her surgical overhaul for awards season is truly gruesome, and indeed the outward aspect of the cast in general shows a loving, or rather a loathing, attention to detail. For your consideration: Best Makeup. (2006) — Duncan Shepherd
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