To Die For

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Year:	1995
Country of origin:	UK / USA
Director:	Gus Van Sant
Genre:	Celebrity culture black comedy
Starring:	Nicole Kidman, Matt Dillon, Joaquin Phoenix, Alison Folland
Rating:	4/5
IMDB link:	http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114681/
Tagline:	All she wanted was a little attention.
Favourite line:	"You aren't really anybody in America if you're not on TV."

Call me a curmudgeonly old prick if you must - many do - but most comedies seem to me to be movies for morons, aimed squarely at the slack jawed element of society that find people's pants falling down and setting fire to farts the height of fucking hilarity.
Call me Mr Contrary, folks, but most comedy movies are utter shit.
Plain and simple.
Then you get to see a movie like To Die For, and all your expectations are blown straight out of the crackpipe you've been hawking on in a desperate bid to make Will Ferrell even mildly entertaining.

The plot:
Nicole Kidman plays Suzanne Stone Maretto, a hugely ambitious woman desperate for her shot at fame. She presents the weather on a two-bit cable channel but yearns for more. With a cold malevolence, she hatches a plot to exploit three waster teens with the ultimate intention of killing her husband then selling her story for millions.

That's it for the plot, but this is really all about the script.
Savagely black humour scorches the screen, as her character takes blithe swipes at the culture of celebrity and Hollywood in general.
It's funny too.
Laugh out loud funny, I mean.
Not the funny 'you laugh simply because all of the other dribbling fucknuts in the cinema are laughing,' funny, I'm talking real funny.
Genuine funny.
Wit, people.
Wit.
Are you listening, you feckless imbeciles?
WIT! Not setting fire to bottom burps; not smutty, vaguely misogynistic jock high jinx. Will Ferrell wouldn't even begin to be able to deliver these lines with the precision that the ever reliable Kidman manages: and she's a woman, for Christ's sake. What are you thinking, Ferrell?
Anyway, rant over.
Maybe it's been a bad day at work. I didn't think so, but reading that back makes me suspect it was.
In summary: Watch this movie. It's very good.