The Movie: George Clooney made his directorial debut directing this film with a screenplay by Charlie Kaufman, based on Gong Show creator and host Chuck Barris' supposedly autobiographical book about how he was working as a hitman for a government agency, while simultaneously working on his game shows in Hollywood. Whether it's true or not, who knows.

The plot itself wasn't all that compelling to me, though i did like the unique and surreal transitions that were done through actual physical stagings rather than using computer or optical effects which was effective in creating a semi-dream-like feel that helped emphasize the question of how much of this story really did happen, and how much of it was pure fabrication. It gave me some hope that yes, there are some filmmakers out there that are not stuck in the rut of making movies that have to portray a world that looks and behaves exactly like normal reality... and are willing to find ways to really do it instead of just reaching straight for the green screen. But maybe that's just my theater background coming out.

Overall I'd call this just an okay movie that I'm just giving extra points to because of the imaginative physical stagings, haha. It might be worth checking out... depending on your tastes. If you like conspiracy theories, you'd probably like it. If you were a fan of Chuck Barris' shows, you might like it. And if you like not quite standard story telling in your films... you might like it. So. Yeah, you might like it. Haha.

The DVD: I don't really know what to say about the video transfer. While it did exhibit an overall softness, there were some flashback portions of the film that were supposed to have a nostalgic TV look but the end result on my screen was a muddled mess with crushed blacks and stepped gradients so bad there was an almost posterized look to those sections. The audio was not the cleanest I've ever heard, but on a somewhat subjective scale, it was "better" than you might expect from the quality of the video.

Special features include a number of featurettes, some of them getting into the overall look of the film along with some behind the scenes footage of how some of the complex transitions were staged. You also get a ton of deleted scenes, which I have to admit, I did not bother to watch.

Basically if you really like this film, then I think the behind the scenes stuff would make this DVD a worthy purchase, but otherwise you will probably be fine with a rental, and if you never see this film in your life, you probably won't be missing a whole lot. Although Drew Barrymore is awfully cute, as always :)