Marginal Revolution: Idiocracy

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Idiocracy

Made by the director of Office Space, this politically incorrect dystopian comedy portrays a future where dysgenics have made everyone a moron. It should appeal to those who enjoy watching stupid people behave stupidly, not to those who demand legitimate filmmaking. In other words, it's pretty damn funny. There are some classic lines, like "Welcome to Costco, I love you." DVD only.

Posted by Tyler Cowen on January 9, 2007 at 08:28 PM in Film | Permalink

Comments

This movie would have been a lot better had they not intentionally and ironically dumbed it down so the average moron could understand it. They have a narrator explaining everything, every emotion, every justification for the protagonists's actions... and the whole movie is about dumbing down and stupidity. This irony would be hilarious if id didn't ruin the movie.

Posted by: bruce at Jan 9, 2007 10:25:58 PM

I saw this in theaters when it "released" in 5 cities in late summer and can't remember the last movie I saw that was funnier. (I saw it with a raucous sold-out audience at a typical screening in Austin, TX.) Sadly, my guess is that this movie will not find it's audience. Fox refused to release this wide theatrically, and it's 5-city limited release did NOT include New York City, making it inaccessible to a large percentage of critics. Why would Fox try to kill this (no critics screenings, no posters, no ads, no trailers, not even a website)? Which particular market inefficiency leads well-made films to go unreleased _after all the costs have been put up_???

Posted by: dave at Jan 9, 2007 11:40:16 PM

Talk about the synchronicity! Idiocracy was on at the home of the best burgers in Austin tonight (http://www.casinoelcamino.net/).

Posted by: billb at Jan 9, 2007 11:54:19 PM

Dave, its actually worse, they didn't release the DVD until today so they deliberately missed the Christmas selling season. I think it will do pretty well as a DVD though, there was a short wait for it on my Netflix queue, and its currently ranked 22nd in sales/hr on amazon. I think the resistance to releasing it is obvious, it says some people have too many children and makes corporations look pretty bad. I thought it was good, but it seemed low budget at times (the CGI seens looked cheap), but it had a lot of background jokes so I am really looking forward to seeing it again on DVD.

Posted by: ben at Jan 10, 2007 12:31:17 AM

Genes and IQ. What could possibly be controversial about that?

Posted by: Tino at Jan 10, 2007 1:21:52 AM

Despite the dumbed-down narration, Idiocracy is still much, much smarter than "Borat," and just about as funny.

Here's my review of Idiocracy in The American Conservative:

http://www.isteve.com/Film_Idiocracy.htm

Here's my profile of Idiocracy's creator, Mike Judge, one of the most interesting figures in American pop culture:

http://www.vdare.com/sailer/060326_judge.htm

And here I work the numbers to see if Judge's dysgenic IQ prophecy is quantitatively plausible:

http://vdare.com/sailer/061217_idiocracy.htm

Posted by: Steve Sailer at Jan 10, 2007 4:27:32 AM

Ben - yes, Idiocracy certainly is critical of some aspects of our society, but not as much as what the Simpsons has been doing for years. I know animation often gets a free pass, but Fox did greenlight the movie having read the script, so I find it hard to believe that content lead to the dumping unless there was some high-level interference.
yes, the CGI was indeed cheap as the budget was lower than the concept needed. and yes, the delay until after Christmas is another "let's bury this" technique that I can't seem to make sense of. I do hope that this, like Office Space, becomes the Movie That Fox Couldn't Crush.

Posted by: dave at Jan 10, 2007 9:22:44 AM

Boy, Mr. Sailer, you really went off on a tangent in that Mike Judge article which ended with the quote from the blog "Your Lying Eyes":

"Right now our real-estate boom has kept men busy building things, but once that cools off … the growing crisis will soon become apparent. The notion that education—acquiring new skills for the new economy—will relieve this crisis is just plain silly. Computer programming jobs are already being outsourced in droves—exactly what skills are these guys supposed to acquire in order to remain competitive in the global marketplace? Bioengineering? Nuclear physics?"

and then tied it in with:

"Good questions.

Hopefully, Mike Judge will explore them in the future."

Um, yeah, hopefully. I enjoy you're writing by the way.

Posted by: josh at Jan 10, 2007 9:33:42 AM

Dave, I suggest here that Fox may have gone straight to DVD from fears (probably legitimate ones) of alienating sponsors and audiences.

Posted by: Jason Briggeman at Jan 10, 2007 10:01:30 AM

Idiocracy was funny but, like Borat, fell well short of its potential. An idiot-dystopia? It was destined to be one of the funniest movies of all time!

Posted by: eriks at Jan 10, 2007 10:12:37 AM

For those in the DC area, the Drafthouse is having midnight showings of the film this Friday and Saturday night.

Posted by: Jeremy H. at Jan 10, 2007 3:32:47 PM

If you want to understand why Fox killed it, see "They Live!"

Posted by: Mike Huben at Jan 10, 2007 3:51:03 PM

Mike - Fox executives are aliens plotting to take over the world?!?

(Actually, wouldn't surprise me).

Posted by: dave at Jan 10, 2007 8:31:21 PM

i rented this dvd last night based on the rec from TC and the comments.

while i wasn't as dissapointed in the film as my girlfriend, i thought it was a little much. the social commentary was poignant and funny, but the movie was too long. a 30 min short would have been fine. i really didn't think judge used the 90 mins well. at best this should have been a 1 hour time slot comedy central special.

meanwhile, those of you who think fox is trying to bury this film because of the message seem a little overly dramatic to me. i was expecting a rupert murdoch figure in the film. there really just isn't that much to object to in the film. it's like south park lite.

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