This was a perplexing delight when it originally aired, and I like it even more on DVD. Musician-actor John Lurie somehow got the idea (and approval) to create a six-episode fishing show, featuring celebrity friends in exotic locations. The genre’s typical tenets are accounted for, but taken in somewhat odd directions. Shots of men sitting in boats are paired with an authoritative narrator who often seems oblivious or ill-informed about what’s actually on screen. Lurie and guests genuinely want to catch a haul and document their journeys, but a true fishing devotee would find their occasional off-kilter behavior to be cryptic. Tom Waits becomes manic during a long, hot day, refreshing himself with a trouserful of red snapper. Matt Dillon hesitantly joins in a ceremonial dance learned from a Costa Rica native. Willem Defoe appears chipper and playful as he and his host fail at ice fishing, eventually freezing to death. (A temporary demise, fortunately.) Dennis Hopper, unsettling in any environment, rides out an extended sugar rush in Thailand. Nothing really over-the-top, but the juxtaposition of dead-pan absurdity in a traditionally droll format makes for a bizarre atmosphere. It’s what you might expect if aliens attempted to mimic our lazy Sunday afternoon TV shows. Lurie provides a commentary track, offering essential but equally strange background on each episode and the program’s creation. His stories may have questionable reliability, but they add to the subtly surreal nature of the show. He mentions a longing to return to the series, but the limited run nicely captures the off-the-cuff magic that probably couldn’t be reproduced.

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