While Coleman Hough's screenplay may be too cutesy and tricky for its own good, Steven Soderbergh's arty Dogma-95-style experiment finds its pleasures in the freewheeling, improvised ensemble acting he encourages to shape what would initially appear to be a formless mess about a day in the interconnected lives of people both within and on the fringes of the L.A. film community. The performances themselves range from the mildly interesting (Blain Underwood and Julia Roberts) to the decent (David Hyde Pierce and Catherine Keener) to the very good (Mary McCormack and Nikky Katt, very funny as a modern-day Hitler in the stage play `The Sound And The Fuhrer') but everyone gets credit for taking part with a relaxed, happy-to-be-there manner. After a couple of minor crowd-pleasers in `Traffic' and `Ocean's Eleven' that found him to be working perhaps a bit too familiarly within the studio system (`Erin Brockovich' and `The Limey' displayed the ability to actually get something personal done inside that system), Soderbergh seems intent on going to a non-conformist extreme using studio money (the film is a Miramax release with Jeff Garlin of `Curb Your Enthusiasm' playing `Harvey, Probably', a direct reference to Miramax head honcho Harvey Weinstein) and while he doesn't quite get there--it's a mannered and self-conscious piece, a bit afraid of the freedom provided it--there's enough serious intent to make it a worthwhile effort.
Review of Full Frontal
