DVD Reviews

Idiocracy

• Rating:
• Director:
• Starring: Dax Shepard
• Details: Out Now.

DVD Release Date: Out Now.

The epitome of the word 'Average', Joe Bauers (Wilson) is skating through life, doing just enough to get by; that is, until his superiors in the army nominate him to be part of a top secret government experiment which involves him being cryogenically frozen for a year, along with low-class prostitute Rita (Rudolph). After the programme is cancelled, they wake up 500 years later to discover they are in fact the most intelligent people on earth, after humanity has grown progressively dumber throughout the years. From the director of one of the biggest cult films of the last few decades (the excellent Office Space) Mike Judge also created highly-rated TV skeins Beavis and Butthead and King of the Hill; thus Idocracy comes with a certain level of anticipation (which it dutifully delivers upon, albeit with somewhat patchy results.) While Judge's visual style has evolved quite nicely since Office Space, his script here lacks focus and works off a very broad, if intriguingly clever idea, never really engaging us into the messy plot that involves Wilson being chased by the fuzz, and subsequently becoming part of the White House cabinet. That said, what it loses in narrative coherence and repetition, it makes up for with some fantastic gags, with Dax Shepard giving his funniest performance to date (admittedly, easy enough), as a plank who inexplicably becomes Bauer's lawyer. So, while it may not reach the dizzy satiric heights it obviously aspires to, it's still a relatively smart comedy that deserved much more than a straight-to-DVD release. Idiocracy is the type of film people will stumble upon and rewatch for years, and, despite its flaws, is destined for cult status.

Review by Mike Sheridan