My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer
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80 comments:
Steve, when will you finally admit that Idiocracy sucked?
"Lawful Neutral said...
Steve, when will you finally admit that Idiocracy sucked?"
Why should he? It didn't. It was uproariously funny. I don't think I've ever laughed as hard as I did at the scene where the stoned woman had her kid taken away by the Carl's Jr. vending machine.
Relax, and have some Brawndo.
"Steve, when will you finally admit that Idiocracy sucked?"
Steve will never admit that Idiocracy sucked monkey balls. He likes the message of the movie too much. He is like a feminist who rants and raves about the "Vagina Monologues," despite the fact that the play sucked bad.
"Idiocracy" as a concept would have best been done as an SNL skit that lasted no longer than, let's say, 10 minutes. The fact that Judge turned this idea into a movie is a travesty.
I watched the movie once, and I sure wish I hadn't.
This movie was terrible. I sat through it at a matinee this week and wow, it looked like Judge had popped a few horse tranquilizers himself before the shoot. Enervated doesn't begin to describe this limping, unnecessary production.
On the other hand, I once felt Idiocracy had a weak third act but have watched it recently and found myself laughing insanely at the movie from start to finish. I don't know what it is but the movie has gotten 2-3 times funnier since I last saw it.
Idiocracy had it's moments, but it was too uncomfortable, at least today, to watch. When President Obam...er..Camacho started yelling before the idiot filled "House of Representin'" I squirmed uncomfortably in my seat.
This movie looks much the same since it's the same thing my workplace has had to go through every couple of years. Nothing like sweating about losing your job because some leech law firm is looking to suck the life out of your workplace because of some parasitic idiot.
"Fine, but Red State moneymen should keep in mind that out-bribing each other for the best high school athletes is a zero sum game, while changing the culture is not."
Don't forget USC boosters bribed Reggie Bush to play there. Is there no sin Californians are exempt from? You guys are destroying the culture with your Hollywood movies and bribing high school athletes. Steve, move to Texas!
"Steve, when will you finally admit that Idiocracy sucked?"
It didn't suck. Even if it wasn't funny (which it was), it still wouldn't have sucked because of the simple fact that the battle of ideas should be more important than bread and circuses to anyone who's not an easily-distracted idiot of the kind Idiocracy portrayed.
And how DO you make a movie about the death of civilization hysterically funny or entertaining? There WERE funny scenes there, but it wasn't really trying to compete with the Harold and Kumar stuff. And thank God for that.
Wow, well done Steve.
If you ever start that hedge fund using your insights, as I suggested, you'll be able to finance a Mike Judge movie yourself.
As much as I wanted to like it, when I finally did get around to seeing Idiocracy I understood why Fox dumped it. The opening was indeed brilliant, but the rest mostly sucked.
Extract was an okay movie but nothing to write about - as Steve well demonstrated in his empty review of the thing. Office Space was pretty good but then got lost in the comedy of errors of the kids' scheme. Idiocracy was somewhat sloppy and silly in its final form (after they editors realized no one would ever see the film and simply stopped caring) but what still remained one of the most awesome movies ever made. The social critiques were fantastic, particularly the critiques of advertising culture. All he had to do was exaggerate the current advertising condition just a tad to demonstrate how creepy Walmart Greeters are, how cynical Big Businesses are and how easily manipulated the herd of hominids are when the wealthy elite are allowed constant access to everyone's senses.
Idiocracy could well have done without it's endless "rehabilitation night" scene (as well as a few others) but it's sledgehammer messages make the thing worth any ten high-grossers. Maybe more.
The good thing is that despite being killed at the theaters by studio execs, Idiocracy seems to have achieved cult status. It's been getting played pretty regularly on Comedy Central for the past year or so.
It didn't suck. Even if it wasn't funny (which it was), it still wouldn't have sucked because of the simple fact that the battle of ideas should be more important than bread and circuses to anyone who's not an easily-distracted idiot of the kind Idiocracy portrayed.
Duh. Anyone in Steve's comment section (because he likes Steve's work) who doesn't find Idiocracy funny will enjoy it as a political film disguised as a comedy. Like Dr. Strangelove, except the home team wins.
I liked Office Space. I work in that mileaux (sp) and it certainly had the ring of truth. TPS report headers. Very, very true.
I can see the SNL comparisons.
Something About Mary was the funniest movie I've seen in the past 15 years. No idea what there politics are.
Never saw idiocracy. Even if it was that good, I don't want to see a movie based on a premise like that; it'd have to be a one joke movie.
I already like Extract, and I won't see it until it hits the bargain bin at Blockbuster, for no other reason than it pisses off reviewers from the NY Times.
Also, Steve-stein, there are two trends that beg your analysis. First, that movie theaters are selling a sensory experience rather than a movie experience, and price competition in technology is enabling that experience to be reproduced in home theaters. Second, and following from the first, lots of increasingly bigger name stars are showing up in direct-to-video movies.
I remember channel surfing a few years back and seeing Jonathan Rhys-Davies in a SciFi Channel schlockfest, after the Lord Of The Rings films. Nobody's laughing at him now.
Saw "Extract" over the weekend and it was numbingly bad. Not a memorable line in the film. And if it "embodies a conservative worldview" then I'm Subcomandante Marcos.
Steve, just admit that Judge is part of the same old Hollywood trash machine keeping your hometown on life support. Let the oil tycoons waste money on their silly charities and heartfelt personal projects in peace.
Speaking of Steve Sailer denial issues: Sailer, are you still deleting any and all Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth links?
http://www.ae911truth.org/
I sure hope not. Richard Gage is an American hero.
More than 800 architectural and engineering professionals have joined him. Who the hell are you to dismiss their research? You, who are supposedly so math & science oriented.
WE HAVE REACHED A PERMANENT PLATEAU OF PROSPERITY.
SUBPRIME IS CONTAINED.
NANO-THERMITE DOES NOT EXIST.
The problem with Idiocracy was that it had a plot at all. The best things about it were its concept, its art direction, and its parodic extrapolation of consumerist/corporatist culture into a dysgenic future. What would have made the movie brilliant would have been to play it straight as a sort of futuristic documentary, while lingering over all the great art direction, hand jobs at Starbucks etc.
Steve frequently and rightfully praises the work of Mike Judge. Unfortunately I believe he has completely written off or snidely ignored Beavis&Butt-Head. That show was an absolutely brilliant satire of lower middle-class,flyover state,suburban culture.
I think you'd have a hard time making money with an HBD hedge fund. The problem is people generally behave economically the same way they'd behave if they were evil racist HBD true believers. Notice how property values actually stack up, where people who have a choice actually send their kids, etc. For a lot of folks too poor to afford to win the bid for said positional resources, the HBD denial at least offers a convenient rationalisation for their choices. It is, for instance, a lot easier to tell yourself that you send your kids to a public school because you want your kids to experience 'diversity' or show your solidarity with the goal of universal public education or whatever than to tell yourself you only send them to public school because you can't afford private school tuition or to have one of the parents homeschool the child. To make economic profits on an HBD hedge fund, you'd probably need to reach for 3rd and 4th order effects of HBD, most of the 1st and 2nd order effects are already baked into the cake of the market price.
Extract had some great moments- when Bateman is dealing with the gigolo nailing his wife and he silently seethes at the dinner table- comic gold. Bateman recovered some of that Arrested Development magic and put it on display. Seasons 1 and 2 of AD are the best works of art in the history of the world- yes, I know what you're thinking- it's better than the Sistine Chapel.
Udolpho- I've read your blog- you don't know funny
Idiocracy had some hilarious scenes but was a slight disappointment. Dax Shepherd is a funny dude though- would like to see him get more roles.
Dan in DC
very disappointing Steve's guys didn't find Extract funny....is that Larry Auster guy accepting comments?
Dan in DC
I can't believe there are people who didn't find Idiocracy hilarious. Nearly all of Mike Judge's work is outstanding - I agree with the previous commenter who says that Beavis and Butthead is tragically underrated, too.
"To make economic profits on an HBD hedge fund, you'd probably need to reach for 3rd and 4th order effects of HBD, most of the 1st and 2nd order effects are already baked into the cake of the market price."
You make good points David, but you miss the big picture. Steve's hedge fund wouldn't actually need to generate significant alpha (outperformance) for Steve to make money; Steve just needs to gather enough money to make money on the management fee. If he hits a bogey and get an extra vig off of that, that's just gravy. Most fund managers (whether hedge funds or mutual funds) have mediocre performance. Being a mediocre fund manager pays well, as long as you have a big enough asset base.
I disliked two bits in Extract. First, the gigolo "Brad Chavez". By casting a white guy with a Hispanic last name, they are erasing boundaries of ethnicity. This is something that liberals try to do. Second, they made the unsympathetic old woman blame the Hispanic worker and then they exonerate the Hispanic worker. This is a criticism of those who object to Hispanics entering the workplace.
dan in DC:
"very disappointing Steve's guys didn't find Extract funny....is that Larry Auster guy accepting comments?"
If you found "Extract" funny, you're a reductionist and therefore a nihilist.
Or maybe if you don't find "Extract" funny, you're a reductionist and therefore a nihilist.
There, now you can skip Mr. Auster's comments.
-Steve Johnson
Steve wrote:
"Red State zillionaires looking to have a positive impact on our culture could do much worse things with their money than to back Judge the way Blue Staters have backed Allen over the years."
I think that red-state zillionaires should have been fed up with the mainstream media by now, and should get together and buy out one of the networks (ABC, NBC, or CBS) and only hire-center-right anchors, producers, and reporters, and opinion commentators---like Steve Sailer for instance, as well as fund (even if at a loss) a center-right newspaper in every major city in America. I cannot fathom why they have not been willing to do this as we slowly lose this nation while allowing liberals to basically have the media to themselves.
Shout out on Arrested Development - abso0lutely smartest, funniest and overall tightest show that I have ever watched. You can watch the thing three times and STILL not catch all of the wordplays. Absolutely brilliant.
(Unless of course you're a hick. Then you'll get everything the first time around and just go abo0ut seething about all teh swipples who liked it. I mean if swipples like it, it must suck. Identity politics at it's best.)
Steve,
Can you please explain your marked differentiation between gifted vs. talented? In my mind, they are pretty close to synonyms. Thanks.
Haven't seen Extract yet. Will wait for it to get to the 2nd run theater.
Idiocracy was uneven. It got off to a slow start. The script could have been tighter. The supporting cast was weak. It did have its moments of brilliance tho. I had a President Camacho flashback last night watching The One reading from the teleprompter: "Shit. I know shit's bad right now, with all that starving bullshit, and the dust storms, and we are running out of french fries and burrito coverings. But I got a solution."
Beavis and Butthead remains the best animated series evarrr. South Park and The Family Guy come nowhere near.
"the battle of ideas should be more important than bread and circuses to anyone who's not an easily-distracted idiot..."
I've yet to see the movie (I saw about five minutes of TV once and wasn't impressed, but the whole thing might be better), but has anyone ever offered non-Steve evidence that Judge meant any kind of political statement whatsoever by it? My impression is that the idea of dysgenic breeding is a MacGuffin to explain why everyone is so stupid and that something like a nuclear radiation accident could have worked just as well to set the plot in motion. To those who have seen the film, am I right or wrong? Is dysgenic breeding ever mentioned after the first five minutes?
I am planning to see "Extract," and I'm also assuming that like Mike Judge's other movies, it will become funnier upon repeated viewings.
I love "Office Space" and each time I watch it, I laugh harder than before -- I always notice some subtle little thing that I didn't catch on earlier viewings.
While I liked "Idiocracy," I didn't think it was quite as funny as "Office Space." However, I just watched it for a 2nd time when it was on TV the other night and laughed my butt off. I may have to purchase the DVD as it looks like another one that improves after multiple viewings.
So we'll see about "Extract."
Steve,
The college football allusion and reference to OK State is very important for people to understand.
I recommend you read the amazing book "Meat Market" which chronicles one year in the big time recruiting process in the SEC under a former head coach at Ole Miss.
Really amazing stuff.
Tall People Are Happier Than Petite Peers, Princeton Test Shows
The findings support a hypothesis put forth in 2008 that tall people are more likely than shorter people to have reached their full cognitive potential, the researchers said. Poor nutrition and childhood diseases may stunt growth and limit mental development in some cases, they said.
“There is good evidence that cognitive and physical function develop together,” the researchers said. “It is this lack of full cognitive development that accounts for lower levels of education, and lower earnings in adulthood which, in turn, are almost entirely responsible for lower levels of life evaluation, and poorer emotional outcomes.”
http://tinyurl.com/lygjr3
Short people have no reason. Perhaps Judge should have employed a creepy side show cast of munchkins for Idiocracy.
Unlike Christopher Guest, who's closer to the Woody Allen template (altho a hell of a lot funnier and a better filmmaker), Judge is at bottom a middle-class sentimentalist who sugar-coats his misanthropy with happy endings, even in Idiocracy and a la King of the Hill. This obviously isn't making his movies more marketable. Guest is working the same vineyard as Judge, but there's not a sympathetic character to be found in his movies--all are punished by their illusions and none are pardoned, as illustrated most pointedly by the brutal self-disfigurement of the Catherine Harris character in For Your Consideration.
Maybe Judge needs to assemble a troupe of talented actors attuned to his vision and start turning out one a year (not sure Boone Pickens would be up for financing a movie whose major plot developments hinge on the loss of a testicle, tho). As several of your callers point out, there's something lacking in Extract, although it's hard to put a finger on.
To the caller grousing about the "Brad Chavez" character: Man, you need to get out of the house more often, because there's lots of blonde-haired "Brad Chavezes" and "Chad Lopezes" afoot in these United States, particularly in Texas. Judge's recognition of this is just one of the many little ways he demonstrates his powers of observation ('course, he calls your attention to it, which he needn't do).
BTW, there's an obnoxious slip-and-fall lawyer in Houston named Jim "The Texas Hammer" Adler who advertises heavily on the TV, now mostly in Spanish. Offices in the heavily petro-industrial end of the county but lives in a WASPy enclave in town. Judge is probably aware of the guy but sets his "Adler" lawyer way apart from the real-life Adler, at least physically, altho both are cartoons of a sort.
Get off it Steve. They didn't release Idocracy in theatres for one reason and one reason only: It was shit.
Dumb, predictable, sophomoric and just not funny at all. You are WAAAAYYY to close to the material my friend.
Svigor, comparing a Mike Judge film to a Stanley Kubrick film is like comparing Mr. Softee to Paris creme brulé; and yes, B&B was Judge's best work. Office Space was a good "little" movie, and K.O.T.H is highly overrated and has been since day one.
BTW, I knew two people here in Albuquerque who went to high school with Judge. Neither of him could remember him so there is hope for you Betas after all!
A few months ago, purely by accident, I Netflixed "Idiocracy" and "Children of Men" at the same time. My wife and I watched them on back-to-back nights--kind of a Doubleheader of the Apocalypse. Liked 'em both, though oddly enough, the comedy arguably provided the bleaker view of the future.
Making something "funny" out of the thematic material of Idiocracy would have been akin to making a romantic comedy out of the Gulag Archipelago.
Granted, Judge did try to do exactly that with Idiocracy [a romantic comedy overlaying the most deadly-serious thematic material], so he has only himself to blame if the movie didn't work the way we would have wanted it to work.
Office Space involves only slightly less serious themes - a man [and his lover] revolting against the nihilism of the modern world - turning their backs on SWPL and trying to reinvent themselves as human beings again [or at least turning their backs on what we would now call "SWPL" - remember, Office Space is ten years old, and "SWPL" has only been in our vocabulary for a year or two].
Which is to say that Office Space is essentially Orwell's 1984 recast as a saccharine-sweet American television sitcom episode [or a week's worth of episodes].
But I don't know that any producer would have given the green light to a realistic vision of Idiocracy - if Terry Gilliam's Brazil is the realistic [or surrealistic] Office Space, then a realistic Idiocracy would have had to have been filmed in The Fabulous Ruins of Detroit or the Lost City of Chernobyl.
And besides, that's not Judge's style.
PS: Apparently Putin just gave the green light for the Gulag Archipelago to be added to the Russian high school curriculum:
Russia makes Gulag horrors book required reading
By BEN JUDAH, Associated Press Writer
Wed Sep 9, 12:32 pm ET
news.yahoo.com
PPS: The most important aspect of Idiocracy is that gazillions of SWPLs were lulled into watching the introduction to the movie, with the evil careerist-feminazi witch, and her hen-pecked beta husband, who postponed their attempts at childbearing until after the point at which her womb had gone barren.
If nothing else, maybe that one scene alone will get a few hundred thousand SWPLs to reconsider their nihilism and perhaps we'll get a handful of babies out of them instead - babies who otherwise might never have been born.
[Or maybe I'm being delusional when I allow myself to fantasize that there is anything at all which can awaken those folks from their nihilism.]
". . .(J.K. Simmons, who is funny in everything, even Burn After Reading)..."
Why the snide comment? It's obvious that "Raising Arizona" is the single biggest influence on the work of Mike Judge. I like Judge, but he's not the Coen brothers.
What the Coens understand is that what those on the left side of the bell curve need more than anything is to transcend the physical world. Reductionism is a dead end. Steve, stop banging your head against the blackboard and become A Serious Man.
"I disliked two bits in Extract. First, the gigolo "Brad Chavez". By casting a white guy with a Hispanic last name, they are erasing boundaries of ethnicity. This is something that liberals try to do. Second, they made the unsympathetic old woman blame the Hispanic worker and then they exonerate the Hispanic worker. This is a criticism of those who object to Hispanics entering the workplace."
Come to think of it, King of the Hill is pretty friendly towards Mexicans too. Maybe Judge is George Bush and from his state got a distorted view of the invasion.
Second, they made the unsympathetic old woman blame the Hispanic worker and then they exonerate the Hispanic worker. This is a criticism of those who object to Hispanics entering the workplace.
Judge is a conservative. Conservatives LOVE LOVE LOVE Hispanic migrant workers.
"Beavis and Butthead" is underrated?
I wonder if the gigolo's name (Brad Chavez) was a reference to the British "chav" phenomenon. I thought the old lady blaming the innocent hispanic was funny. Was it PC? Maybe.
Anyway, I laughed really hard until my buzz wore off near the end...
"The problem is people generally behave economically the same way they'd behave if they were evil racist HBD true believers. "
This is mostly true, but there are exceptions to the rule. I'm thinking of naive, brainwashed SWPL kids who make up the first wave of a typical round of gentrification. The "artists" and other poseurs who move into old crackhouses and slowly gentrify a ghetto. Some of them do get killed in the process and it sometimes even makes the headlines here in NYC. I feel for those kids - I was brainwashed too at their age, though not to that extent.
Another example - upper middle class SWPL couples adopting third world kids.
There's no way to make money from any of this, but no, not everyone in the SWPL camp is a subconscious hypocrite. Most are, of course.
I bought Idiocracy on Steve's recommendation and I laughed the first time I watched it.
The second time I watched Idiocracy I realized that Mike Judge was advocating that Blacks and Whites work together to keep out the Mexican flood that he thinks will turn America into a nation of idiots. After realizing that I felt like an idiot myself.
Or maybe I am overanalyzing the film, or just wrong.
By casting a white guy with a Hispanic last name, they are erasing boundaries of ethnicity.
Wow, the whole country of Spain must really confuse you.
The name "Chavez" is Portuguese, it's from the word for keys.
Agree B&B was sometimes howlingly funny. I think it "jumped the shark" at some point tho,as my interest seemed to fall off about 2/3 of the way thru its run. (The same thing happened with my all time fave TV show,'Kung Fu'. By the 3rd season it was dreck. All New Agey and SWPL) I never saw Idiocrarcy but based on lines like,"there was a time when reading wasnt just for fags",well,I may have to reconsider. He says it was called Untitled Mike Judge Production' for a while,but the title he/they settled on wasnt a good one. It should have been more inviting;"-ocracy" is not a funny suffix. Maybe "Reading Is For Fags"? That might get the kids,bless 'em. (reminds me of seeing Fast Times on TV,they bleeped Spicoli's best line,"Those guys are fags!!" Philistines!)
James Kabala: Yes, dysgenic breeding is mentioned at the very end of the movie, and clearly is central to the whole plot.
"Or maybe I am overanalyzing the film, or just wrong."
I vote "B", but hell, Svigor thinks the guy LOVES Mexicans, maybe you two should have a Socratic Cafe.
(Cliff Arroyo)
Judge is some kind of genius, but I'm not quite sure what kind.
The thing is, he's much better at set up and observation but the seams show (badly) when he tries to assemble his visions into conventional story arcs.
Office Space has some great stuff in it and some crap (Peter's post hypnosis behavior jarred with the rest of the movie and the confusion about the two Lumbergh's was unnecessary and added nothing to the plot for starters).
I loved a lot of Idiocracy (for different reasons than Steve) but again the seams showed and it seemed to drag and be longer than it was. Steve's passion for the movie is probably mostly because .... what other movie shares his concerns?
I think if anything Judge should have gone the Altman route with both movies. I think a meandering plotless Office Space and Idiocracy would have been a lot funnier (and could have been a lot longer without being boring). Freed from the tyranny of plot and tidy endings his observational humor and gift for setting up dysfunctional realities in which the self-aware are condemned to somehow function could have soared.
His problem is that he's trying to make neat little stories and that's not his gift. He needs to try to make a big sloppy plotless glorious mess like Nashville.
What are you doing Steve-O? Are you shopping with L.V's donation money in Santa Monica or what?
It's been a HUGE day!
1) The hemorrhoid with eyes has gotten another Obama aid fired (This one's a Jew!).
2) Another "Family Values" Republican in Orange County got busted with his hand in the cookie jar.
3) Levi Johnson had an exposé of Sarah Palin ghostwritten in Vanity Fair. (Word to the wise, for those of you Palinheads, DON'T read the article. IF you do, hide the women and children first!)
Your constituent's need you buddy. Don't fail 'em now!
We have a very SWPL-friendly independent video store near us. Among other things, it has separate sections for the Coen brothers, Iranian movies and Troma - you get the idea. Cool place overall.
The interesting thing is that they also have a section for "staff picks" where each clerk/manager (mostly leftish frumpy hipster women in thick-rimmed glasses, face piercings, and vintage clothing) puts stickers on their current favorites. Idiocracy is practically covered with them.
"1) The hemorrhoid with eyes has gotten another Obama aid fired (This one's a Jew!)."
You finally learned to spell hemorrhoid properly. Good job.
"The interesting thing is that they also have a section for "staff picks" where each clerk/manager (mostly leftish frumpy hipster women in thick-rimmed glasses, face piercings, and vintage clothing) puts stickers on their current favorites. Idiocracy is practically covered with them."
Liberals would love eugenics if it wasn't tied to racism. Central planning, elitism, a promised utopia-what's not to love?
I personally loved the film, except for the ending where (spoiler alert) the two main characters restart the human race with mulatoos.
"BTW, I knew two people here in Albuquerque who went to high school with Judge. Neither of him could remember him so there is hope for you Betas after all!"
Neither of him could remember him? Learn to write properly before you critique everyone else's posts for grammatical errors.
The interesting thing is that they also have a section for "staff picks" where each clerk/manager (mostly leftish frumpy hipster women in thick-rimmed glasses, face piercings, and vintage clothing) puts stickers on their current favorites. Idiocracy is practically covered with them.
Someone once noted that Forrest Gump was meant to be a denigration of Red State America, but was (surprisingly to the filmmakers) seen by the public as a celebration of same. I think Idiocracy suffers from a similar phenomenon: I know hard-core leftists who think it is a brilliant analysis of the future, should average Joe be allowed to breed.
Idiocracy has few blacks in it. And the president, while dumb, is clearly smarter than all but the two time travelers. Judge apparently wants no part of being called racist.
Mustn't criticize a hispanic. Ever. It's the law.
"You finally learned to spell hemorrhoid properly. Good job"
Actually grasshopper, Both spellings are considered correct, sort of like "theater" and "theatre"
As for the "baited breath" thing you brought up, the idiom "bated breath" was originally coined by Shakespere. "bated" was a commonly accepted diminutive for "abated" in his time. "Bated" is not a word used in contemporary English, so the phrase "baited breath" is accepted although it does not make sense. Either you use a word that does not make sense in context or one that is archaic
One hand (6) - (12) the other
"Neither of him could remember him? Learn to write properly before you critique everyone else's posts for grammatical errors."
I do know how to write properly, as a matter of fact, many would say, very well, I did however commit the sin of sloppy haste here in not proofreading. I'd say it is obvious to anyone with a brain that this is what happened.
In any event I do not criticize the spelling/ grammar of anyone who is not calling anyone else stupid/incompetent or an "AA". If you are going to say that you did not have opportunities because of some mythical AA hire when you can't write a sentence, I would say elucidation is well within the rights of the gallery. Wouldn't you?
"Idiocracy has few blacks in it."
And if there were more than a few you would say "It's a white hating movie! It's filled with blacks!
Do you guys really, REALLY not notice your own grinding pathos?
"And the president, while dumb, is clearly smarter than all but the two time travelers."
Is he, or is he just more "aggressive?" If the answer is "b", then I guess the movie was stereotypical after all.
"Judge apparently wants no part of being called racist."
As opposed to most people who just relish the opportunity!
Liberals would love eugenics if it wasn't tied to racism. Central planning, elitism, a promised utopia-what's not to love?
Which would be why they are such hardcore race denialists. They are squashing the Hitler within.
"JeremiahJohnbalaya said...
Someone once noted that Forrest Gump was meant to be a denigration of Red State America, but was (surprisingly to the filmmakers) seen by the public as a celebration of same. I think Idiocracy suffers from a similar phenomenon: I know hard-core leftists who think it is a brilliant analysis of the future, should average Joe be allowed to breed."
Interesting. Perhaps Idiocracy is like The Manchurian Candidate in that way - both left and right think that it is secretly speaking to them.
I think the main reason Idiocracy was put in the bag by the studio was fear of litigation. Unlike in Office Space, in Idiocracy Judge takes vicious aim at some real companies - Costco, Carls Jr., and Starbucks. (I especially liked his take on those obnoxious Hardee's / Carls Jr. TV adds: "Carls Jr. - F**k you! I'm eating!")
And somewhat like 1984, which was not so much a warning of the future, as an alarm sounded about the present (Orwell wanted to call it 1948) - Idiocracy is not just a satire about a dysgenic future (although clearly it is about that), but also a satire of our current, loathsome culture - the agressive stupidity of the black rap milieu (carefully cleansed of actual blacks in this case), and the agressive stupidity of the lower-class white wrestling culture (for want of a better term), the agressive stupidity of mindless officialdom.
It's hard enough to make a truly funny movie (witness how bad most "comedies" are). It's doubly hard to make a message movie that's funny. I think Judge did a bang-up job with Idiocracy, and I look forward to seeing Extract.
Svigor, comparing a Mike Judge film to a Stanley Kubrick film is like comparing Mr. Softee to Paris creme brulé
Still waiting on that answer, T; do white people have the right to self-determination and free association or not?
I've just realised from following the link to the Idiocracy comments that he lifted a few elements straight from the documentary American Pimp.
For example "a pimps love is different from a square's love", the pimp name Upgrade and the phrase "with two ds for a double dose of this pimping".
Obviously Judge regards American Pimp as something of a cultural lowpoint, but I love that film. If you see it for what it is, as an expo of the best of the best smooth talkers and ignore the depravity then its highly entertaining.
Someone once noted that Forrest Gump was meant to be a denigration of Red State America
You have to be kidding - or the filmmakers, very plausibly, were completely incompetent. The leftists, especially Forrest's love interest, in that movie consistently came off as narcissistic and trivial people. If the filmmakers couldn't see that and actually liked those characters than that's pretty delicious irony.
"Still waiting on that answer, T; do white people have the right to self-determination and free association or not?"
Are you still on this Svigor? I answered that at length the last time you asked about a week ago, go back and check the archives.
"Actually grasshopper, Both spellings are considered correct, sort of like "theater" and "theatre""
Lol. No they're not. Try a dictionary.
"an expo of the best of the best smooth talkers"
Seriously?
Mr. Anon said: "And somewhat like 1984, which was not so much a warning of the future, as an alarm sounded about the present (Orwell wanted to call it 1948) - Idiocracy is not just a satire about a dysgenic future (although clearly it is about that), but also a satire of our current, loathsome culture. . ."
This is true and it struck me as a logic problem with the film. Judge sets "Idiocracy" 500 years in the future and ends up with something that looks like a lot of America already does, or will in 5 years. There are other logic problems--I know I'm supposed to overlook them them because it's a comedy, but they still bothered me. For example, in the movie people still have cars that work, TV broadcasts, electrical power, etc, which wouldn't be the case in a society of dummies. (Granted, they have cars in Haiti, but the Haitians aren't building them.) Also, Judge copped out by having the Idiocracy society look like our own demographically. I suppose he couldn't have gotten away with realism in that area. A realistic film about our Idiocratic future would be like the first 20 minutes of "The Gods Must Be Crazy."
I thought "Office Space" was brilliant and I disagree with those who say it was ruined by the embezzlement plot element. It had to have some sort of plot and this worked fine as far as I'm concerned.
I saw "Extract" tonight and found it entertaining and funny, but it wasn't up to "Office Space" standards. It was chuckle-inducing rather than ROTFLMAO. It was well plotted and well cast, and the characters were interesting and believable. Mila Kunis was great. The worst actor in the film was Ben Affleck. I noticed that the theater was almost empty.
And somewhat like 1984, which was not so much a warning of the future, as an alarm sounded about the present (Orwell wanted to call it 1948) - Idiocracy is not just a satire about a dysgenic future (although clearly it is about that), but also a satire of our current, loathsome culture - the agressive stupidity of the black rap milieu (carefully cleansed of actual blacks in this case), and the agressive stupidity of the lower-class white wrestling culture (for want of a better term), the agressive stupidity of mindless officialdom.
You are spot-on. I saw it for the first time a few weeks ago. Post the Michael Jackson officical mourning period and state funeral, it was obvious to me that Judge was not really talking about 500 years in the future - we are living it now.
Ben Affleck
This is a joke, right?
The iSteve-verse just wasted almost 70 comments on a Ben Affleck movie?
Where do we go to get our money back?
Good God, the review could have been a single sentence - "Ben Affleck appears in this movie" - that's all you would have needed to know about it.
Also, Judge copped out by having the Idiocracy society look like our own demographically.
But that's one of the big giveaways that the movie is a satire of current reality. What other film or television show depicts demographic reality, as you can step outside and see it? None. There is not a single one - except for Idiocracy.
I do know how to write properly, as a matter of fact, many would say, very well, I did however commit the sin of sloppy haste here in not proofreading.
While there's generally nothing wrong with your writing, Truth, this sentence...
"What other film or television show depicts demographic reality, as you can step outside and see it? None. There is not a single one - except for Idiocracy."
I thought you guys were always whining about "multiculturalism" and too many blacks on TV?
I was talking about the Latinos, Truth.
Are you still on this Svigor? I answered that at length the last time you asked about a week ago, go back and check the archives.
No you didn't, you dodged the question at length. The way you're dodging right now, or you'd have repeated your "yes" or "no" answer to my "yes" or "no" question, which would be quicker than typing a paragraph.
Man up already.
Steve, you hit the nail on the head - JK Simmons is hilarious. In Burn After Reading he just cracked me up. Dunno' what it is about that guy.
L
PS Idiocracy was also hilarious.
Svigor, I will broach this once again in a very simple manner as you request:
I'm all for you persuing racial separation, move to rural Montana and you won't see blacks, simple.
Do I believe in more laws and government agencies? No. I guess I'm a libertarian and you are a Communist.
Montana is full of Mexicans, Truth, because everywhere Northern Europeans go, they make a functional culture and other people want in on it. Speaking as a non-Northern European myself, I find your refusal to acknowledge the problem bizarre. I want in on the goodies, but I'm willing to behave myself.
"baited breath"
The cat ate the cheese and waited for the mouse with baited breath.
Don't let Richard Lederer catch you defending "baited breath."
I do know how to write properly, as a matter of fact, many would say, very well, I did however commit the sin of sloppy haste here in not proofreading.
Do you include correct grammar in your definition of writing properly? I ask because your comma splicing made me wince.
" I ask because your comma splicing made me wince."
Hopefully, it does not make you wince as much as you persnickety waste of server farm space does me.
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