Waiting for Guffman (1996)

I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

A Major Disappointment

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

Waiting for Guffman, the ensemble-driven mock-u-parody of community theater, differs in one engaging way from writer-director-star Christopher Guest's other inspections of American culture at its most banal. Principally, Guffman follows a group of people who (think they) are on life's upslope, building toward a great achievement of teamwork in showbiz. Guest's other movies with the same cast--viz. Best in Show, A Mighty Wind, For Your Consideration--are far more concerned with portraying the pathos of the has-been. In Guffman, Guest's character, Corky, is the only has-been, and then only if you count '10 years living in New York and failing auditions' as achieving something in show business. Guffman's characters are small town people at their most stereotypical ordinary selves, people yearning for a brush with the magic of being a part of a really good play. Consider Parker Posey's performance as Libby Mae Brown, the Dairy Queen worker. Posey tells you everything you need to know about the listless ennui of being stuck in a place with nothing to do and no way to grow with a couple of wordless moments where she looks away, her eyes reverberating what is not being said about the failure of dreams. Or take Bob Balaban's portrayal of the quietly suffering music teacher, deposed as the director of the town's annual play in favor of the terrible infant that is Corky (who has lived in New York, after all). The scene where Balaban's character reacts to Corky's reappearance at the helm of the production is a master class in comedic character acting in the most tissue-subtle way that it can be delivered.The thing about the failure of never-weres (as opposed to has-beens) is that the failure brings no sanction, no shame. Americans are raised on tales of "The Little Engine That Could" and Abe Lincoln's failed political campaigns before he became the greatest President in history. In America, if you aren't yet anything, and you try, we root for you. If you fail and try again, we find ourselves rooting twice as hard. This striving of small town nobodys towards the stardust of Broadway, home of another Abe, Abe Guffman, gives this film an emotional resonance fundamentally different from Guest's many other projects (even Spinal Tap). The result is that by the end of the film, we're not at all tired of the characters, or annoyed or sapped by their failure to get discovered. Guest could assemble a new script and make the sequel, could make a "Guffman 2," and it would succeed with both his core audience and with a general audience, because everybody (in America, anyway) loves to see a first-timer try to make it big, whether it is their first attempt, or their tenth.

Writer-director Christopher Guest's timing and peculiar sense of humor are purposefully erratic--and it takes some time for him to get an audience off the dime and into the perplexing spirit of his cinematic occasions. Guest is well-attuned to the colorful eccentricities of 'ordinary' folks, yet his knowing nature borders on smirking, and I'm not a big fan of obnoxiousness--no matter how talented the participants. Mockumentary about a small town acting troupe putting on a musical production does benefit from some great players (particularly Fred Willard, Eugene Levy, and the effortlessly funny Catherine O'Hara). However Guest, himself a co-star--giving a rather offensive performance as gay theater director Corky--does not have the pizazz to bring off scenes of uncomfortable ineptitude. One waits in queasy vain for a pay-off that never comes. I assume Guest wants to have some comedic punch within these improvisational set-ups; if so, he's punching with two limp wrists, and his film is awfully long even at 84 minutes. *1/2 from ****

It's all there. The ridiculous characters who live a ridiculous delusion centered around a particular niche of people. The dry, awkward, intentional but not portrayed to be that way humor. It's classic Christopher Guest mockumentary and it's exactly what "Waiting for Guffman" is. The only thing is that Guest never goes the extra step to make these characters anything more than hysterical and it's there for the taking."Guffman" centers around a fictional Missouri town called Blaine in which a local theater director Corky St. Clair (Guest) has agreed to create and direct a show about the history of the town for its 150th anniversary celebration. The film goes through the whole process by interviewing everyone involved and following St. Clair as it all happens. When they hear that a Broadway scout of sorts named Mort Guffman is to attend their performance, they all get incredibly excited.Guest and his usual cast of actors playing yet another set of actors are great once again in this film. Eugene Levy is great as the town's dentist who discovers his theatrical side when he's cast in the show. Fred Willard and Catherine O'Hara continue to apply their off-beat senses of humor to their roles as a husband and wife that run a travel agency despite never having left Blaine in their lives. Parker Posey also demonstrates a great subtle humor to her part as a young Dairy Queen employee.The greatest statement that Guest makes with this film is that it's completely absurd that these people expect their lives to become anything more than dull. You follow them and they're so passionate about it despite clearly having no talent. But at the same time, Guest never really explores that. He just shows you the process of putting on the show in this film and relies on humor to carry you through it. With such great actors and characters like in all his films, it shocks me to see it all get wasted or at the least never fully developed. We never get to see these characters for who they really are despite the fact that we enjoy laughing at them.

Christopher Guest is a comedic genius. It's as simple as that. His part-improv mockumentaries are some of the best comedies in recent cinematic history. 'Waiting for Guffman' is the first.The film focuses on the small-town of Blaine's sesquicentennial (that's 150th) celebration and the original play 'Red, White, and Blaine.' Blaine, MO, is, as everyone knows. . . the stool capital of the world. By 'stool,' I mean the one you sit on. Not the, well, you get it.Complications arise in the production when Broadway announces they're sending a representative (Guffman, as the title suggests) to see the show with the chance of sending it to New York City! However, Corky (Christopher Guest), the off-off-off-off Broadway director in charge of the production, (briefly) leaves the production due to financial complications between him and the town council.Things eventually start to run smooth, however, and the production goes on for the town, and it's a good one at that! Great performances by the usual cast (Eugene Levy, Fred Willard, Catherine O'Hara, Guest, and Parker Posey) make this film one comedy (deeper than most, I must mention). Do not 'Wait'! Final verdict: 9/10.-AP3-