Waiting For Guffman (1996)
The Cast
Christopher Guest .... Corky St. Clair
Fred Willard .... Ron Albertson
Catherine O'Hara .... Sheila Albertson
Parker Posey .... Libby Mae Brown
Eugene Levy .... Dr. Allan Pearl
Bob Balaban .... Lloyd Miller
Deborah Theaker .... Gwen Fabin-Blunt, Councilwoman
Michael Hitchcock .... Steve Stark, Councilman
Scott Williamson .... Tucker Livingston, Councilman
Larry Miller .... Glenn Welsch, Mayor
Don Lake .... Phil Burgess, Blaine Historian
David Cross .... UFO Expert
Paul Dooley .... UFO Abductee
Linda Kash .... Mrs. Allan Pearl
Lewis Arquette .... Clifford Wooley
Matt Keeslar .... Johnny Savage
Brian Doyle-Murray .... Red Savage
Paul Benedict .... Not Guffman (Mr. Roy Loomis)
Way back in 1984, Rob Reiner released a movie called This Is Spinal Tap, a fictional account of a semi-famous metal hair band. Reiner starred as the documentarian Marty DiBergi in the film, following the sad sack band Spinal Tap around on their tour. The film was critically lauded, and it would eventually end up inspiring many further "mockumentaries". Therefore, if you're not a fan of that genre of comedy, blame Meathead.
One of the stars of Spinal Tap, Christopher Guest, directed and co-wrote Waiting For Guffman with his co-star Eugene Levy. Most of the dialogue throughout the film is improvised by the comedically gifted cast Guest assembled for this movie. The subject of the documentary revolves around the town of Blaine, Missouri and the celebration of their 150th anniversary. The town hires one of it's own citizens, Corky St. Clair (Guest), to direct a musical celebrating the best of Blaine, and the documentary explores the creation and execution of the musical, in every aspect.
What this means is that you get to see a wonderful array of characters created by the afforementioned talented cast. Ron and Sheila Albertson (the almost always great Fred Willard and Catherine O'Hara) are small-town actors with dreams of making it big in Hollywood, despite their overwhelming lack of talent which Corky is seemingly oblivious to. Yeah, for the most part it's that kind of movie premise: if anyone involved in the production of the musical were smarter than a post, there'd be no reason to make a documentary about it.
This being Guest's first stab at the "mockumentary" genre, it's not nearly as polished or cohesive a product as Best In Show would turn out to be, nor as entertaining as A Mighty Wind was. Still, it's an alright picture, if you take it as a learning process kind of deal. He found out what capabilities his amazing cast of actors had for the genre, developing a future trust with many of them that would see them back in future roles in Show and Wind.
Still, this isn't a genre that mainstream audiences embrace, with most of the LCD crowd simply not getting it. There's subtle genius at work throughout Guffman, mostly on the part of character actors like Willard, Larry Miller and Bob Balaban. Balaban's music director character isn't in the movie much, but when he is onscreen you can't help but laugh at the quiet intensity that he carries himself. Which leads me to believe he may actually be the only character in the movie that is smarter than a post.
What Guffman is missing is the charismatic documentarian, or at least someone less annoying than Corky to anchor the picture for the 90 minutes it runs. It needs that Marty DiBergi, that Michael Moore character. There is some funny stuff throughout the movie, and thankfully Guest does learn from this movie as he will take his eccentric characterizations to the backseat in future "mockumentaries".
3 / 5