I had a chance to see Christopher Guest’s For Your Consideration this weekend. Fans of his past films (Best in Show, A Mighty Wind) know that he and his gifted casts of improvisers tackle institutions that are so much a part of our pop culture that we tend not to notice their bizarre cult-like tendencies. This time out he pokes fun at the weasels in the film biz. Guest does not let us down with his dry sense of humor; my belly ached at the end of the movie.

The story line features a group of “B” list actors filming the production of Home For Purim. (Take your Yiddish dictionary to the theater!) Their acting is over-the-top bad, but a blogger on the set’s sidelines writes a brilliant review of the resulting movie and cites one of the stars, Marilyn Hack (Catherine O’Hara), as Oscar-worthy. Before you know it, the buzz starts, and the cast ends up on all the heavy-hitting entertainment shows. (One host is played by an overtanned and hilarious Fred Willard.) All the actors get caught up in the award-show frenzy and go to strange lengths to win.

If you don’t see this movie, you are meshugeh ahf toi’t!

–Leslie Rouffe