David Mamet’s filmmaking comedy may not be entirely original, but it’s so shamelessly entertaining that it wins you over anyway. It’s that old chestnut about a Hollywood film crew descending on a small New England town to make a big-budget period drama, complete with precious mega-stars (Alec Baldwin and Sarah Jessica Parker), a writer with a crisis of confidence(Philip Seymour Hoffman), a fast-talking producer (David Paymer) and a director (William H. Macy) who has everything under control…or does he?
The performances are so sharp that they take our breath away, and Mamet jams the film with gags that are so smart, ironic and/or vicious that we don’t have time to notice we’ve heard them all before in other films. Sit back and enjoy.
