For Your Consideration (2006) [Warner Archive Blu-ray review]

For Your Consideration, Christopher Guest’s 2006 satirical mockumentary skewering the absurdities of Hollywood’s awards season, arrived on Blu-ray in 2024 from Warner Archive. While it may lack the same devoted cult following as some of Guest’s most iconic ensemble comedies like This Is Spinal Tap or Best in Show, this biting send-up of the film industry’s propensity to devour its own in the mad pursuit of Oscar gold remains one of his most underrated and increasingly relevant works.

This doesn’t go to 11, more like 7.5

Assembling his usual repertory company of gifted improvisers, including Catherine O’Hara, Harry Shearer, Eugene Levy, Fred Willard, and Parker Posey, Guest takes aim at the insidious machinery of awards season buzz, presaging how much the internet and social media have warped that process in the years since. While it may sacrifice some of the warmth and affection Guest clearly holds for his lovable oddballs in films like Waiting for Guffman and A Mighty Wind, For Your Consideration makes up for it with a lacerating specificity, tapping into the narcissism and desperation that fuel the annual gladiatorial contest for Hollywood’s shiniest trophies.

For Your Consideration really got forgotten post Best in Show

I remember when For Your Consideration arrived in theaters and I think most expected a different movie. Mind you, this was an era before The Office and other mockumentary style shows dominated everything. Hell, Arrested Development treaded in this ground too early and got struck down. While my personal Christopher Guest favorite A Mighty Wind predated For Your Consideration, it feels like a lot of his movies needed angle. A comedy about a niche production about a niche segment of Hollywood doesn’t feel strong enough to carry a feature film. Even with this cast.

While Posey, O’Hara, Shearer and Levy get their moments…there is this undercurrent of forcing a B narrative that doesn’t quite fit. I get it was 2006 and the trope wasn’t so overplayed, but most of America doesn’t give a shit about Hollywood and its industry competitions. I say this as the Academy Awards nominations approach, but it still holds true. It’s possible to have interest in the proceedings from a historical standpoint, but it requires a lot of a mainstream audience to care.

Christopher Guest isn’t for everyone

Young people really don’t dig Christopher Guest, but I guess that’s due to everyone stuffing the mockumentary format down their throat. So many forget how in the 00s, it was rather fresh and interesting. More people associated it with Guest’s style and less with every other sitcom NBC forced to air. But, that’s the rub with studying cinema, you have to look at it as a complete timeline. Thankfully, For Your Consideration gets a fun little time capsule in this Blu-ray. Although, most of the special features are ports over from the old Blu-ray.

Back to the movie for a moment, even the movie in a movie concept is really thin. It’s a wartime look at Southern Jews coming together for a religious Holiday. I know that we’re in the waning days of inclusivity existing in America, but the appeal of the central story that every other story in this film draws its collective power is paper thin.

Final thoughts and Blu-ray talk

And yet, for all its cynicism, there is a strange sort of hope that underlines For Your Consideration’s bleak vision of Hollywood. In the film’s final moments, as Marilyn sits alone in her dressing room after the final indignity of the awards season has been visited upon her, there is a sense that even in the face of such overwhelming emptiness and artifice, the desire to create something meaningful and authentic still endures.

It’s this belief in the power of art to transcend the machinations of commerce and celebrity that ultimately makes For Your Consideration such a powerful and enduring work. And now, thanks to its new Blu-ray release from the Warner Archive Collection, viewers can experience that power in stunning high definition, with a wealth of bonus features that offer new insights into the film’s production and legacy.

Chief among these is a newly-recorded audio commentary track featuring Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy, who co-wrote the film’s screenplay. The track is a treasure trove of insights into the film’s production, with Guest and Levy offering fascinating anecdotes about everything from the casting process to the challenges of crafting such a biting satire of an industry that they have both worked in for decades.

For Your Consideration is now available on Blu-ray from Warner Archive at MovieZyng and many outlets

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