Writer/director Tom DiCillo, whose previous film, Johnny Suede, was also a cult success, hasn't quite got the talent or imagination to make this low-cost comedy worth more than a few chuckles. It takes place on the cramped set of a mini-budget movie, where everything that could go wrong on in one day's shooting proceeds to do so. Even in the dreams of director (Steve Buscemi) and star (Catherine Keener) things are a mess. Given a really punchy treatment, this could have been a riot, but DiCillo's set-ups are too clumsy to make the real thing much better than the fictional fiasco he's portraying. Consequently, the film plays a one-note samba that soon becomes monotonous, with the actors doing little more than going through the motions on either side of the camera. Fine for a few giggles here and there, but nowhere near as good as many critics thought it was.

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