Review of Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002) by Kenr — 27 Oct 2020

Matinee idol George Clooney puts himself in front of and behind the camera for this sleazy examination of the supposed life of TV game show creator and host Chuck Barris. Barris was responsible for several ‘reality’ type shows aimed at low-life Bogan audiences - lowering the bar for quality television by aiming towards cheap sensationalism. Clooney chose this as his first foray into directing but the influence (and ‘help’) from his close allies shines through (Producer Soderberg, and mates, the Cohen’s) This has the look and feel of a ‘clan’ production with money, etc, from another mate; Harvey Weinstein along with ‘you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours’, Democratic Party colluders: Matt Daman & Brad Pitt – seemingly supported by the Hollywood academy. Script wise, between himself and Charlie Kaufman, the aim seems to be to see who can out-swear the other, with an endless barrage of ‘trendy’ foul language - for no other reason than the sensationalised sake of it (hey man, all we ‘creative’ Hollywood types speak like this).

Barris, made highly suspect claims that between his TV game shows he was recruited by the CIA to murder numerous people worldwide, and Clooney has chosen to invest much of his movie to highlight these dubious claims. The visual style from cinematographer Newton Thomas Sigel is neat but Clooney overdoes the sleazy sex scenes and grotty assassinations to turn in a mixed-up, more boring than interesting, pastiche of look-at-me style - with overly obvious pretensions on artiness. Unpleasant and slogs along unrewardingly – but, a few die-hard fans might follow along.