It may be that the movie itself is the satire. Mike Judge was badly treated with Idiocracy. The powers-that-be didn't like the fact that he accurately poked their audiences in the eye. But as these things go, contracts and opportunities come around again and Mike gets a chance to make another film.

So he makes a movie that does just the opposite. he assembles a group of characters that cuts across just about every demographic from rich to dirt-poor. He writes a sit-com-humor-level script that challenges nothing. He presents an idea that is neither radically pointed, nor distasteful enough to be challenged and then sits back and sees if the public bites.

And if they do then he can shake his head and go back to making the kind of satire that goes over most people's head but will keep those that don't see the real humor amused. And if it fails he can point to it as an example of why he doesn't make "Hollywood" movies. Either way, he's the one who wins - monetary or moral victory is assured.

It occurs to me that "an assembly line movie" is an appropriate setting.

I'm not gonna lie. I like testical humor. Hell, even Inglourious Basterds has some singular Ball Hits.

I've never seen a Mike Judge movie in the theaters though, and I doubt I'll start with this one.

maryann,

This movie rocked. Saw it in Austin. Did you actually watch the same movie I did? I'm sure you are good at what you do!!! Just way off base here. You're tryin too hard.

LAte,
TMSTY

Assembly lines are inherently funny...

Unless you have to work on one.

That said, Modern Times-which has been known to have a scene or two involving assembly lines--is one of my favorite all-time comedies and I'd rather stay home and watch the DVD for that than go out and see this.

Then again, I found Office Space not all that funny after the first ten minutes. And I always thought that a lot of the commentary about Idiocracy was unintentionally funnier than the movie itself.

I do agree with MaryAnn on the merits of King of the Hill. Could it be that Mike Judge said everything he really needed to say in that series and that other animated series he was famous for? (No, not The Goode Family.) Maybe that explains why he appears to be all out of ideas on this current project? Or maybe he's just killing time until the next Spy Kids movie...

Geez, MAJ, the way you described it kind of sounds like Office Space if it had been written from the point of view of Lumbergh. :D

This movie really is *Ow, My Balls!*: a major plot point turns on a testicular injury.

Okay, this line is hilarious. Also, it's sad, because my Football In The Groin fears have been confirmed.

Ow, My Balls! Starring Will Ferrel! Coming this Summer to Theaters Near You!

How far off are we from actually seeing this, America? How far off?!

And don't forget, Brawndo is actually be made and marketed. Scary!

Although, it DOES have electrolytes...

What's even scarier, I was making a point about the dumbing down of our culture, and I used the incorrect word, "be" instead of "being."

Guess *I* am not part of the solution.

I find it amusing reading reviews where the critic is trying to find meaning in a movie that centers around a crotch shot.

While everyone else is laughing, this critic is stumped because she doesn't know what Judge is satirizing.

One of the keys to comedic material is that it's relatable to it's audience. Ever wonder why Jerry Seinfeld is one of the most successful comedians that ever lived?

Well Adam, I find it amusing reading comments where the commenter is trying to tell the reviewer how they should have written their review.

While everyone else is reading and thinking about the review, the commenter is stumped because he doesn't know how anyone could fail to find crotch shots hilarious on so many levels. And someone else finds people who take the time to critique comments on a movie review amusing. See? The internet is a neverending supercilious amusement park ride.

One of the keys to comedic material is that it's subjective. Ever wonder why some people don't relate to the things that you relate to? One of the keys to writing a review is to understand the director's previous work. Ever wonder why so many reviews compare the movie to previous movies from the same director? What kind of a review were you hoping to read at a site called flickfilosopher?

One of the keys to finding a reviewer that is entertaining and useful to you is to understand the perspective that they usually approach movies from. Good luck in your search, I think Matt Pais, or JimmyO might be more up (or down) your alley. Someday, you might even be ready to graduate to Rick Mele, but for now it's probably best that you just keep practicing looking at the tomatometer percentages and posting haughty comments to show all those snooty critics what it feels like to be criticized. You'll show them just how amusing they really are. You'll show them all!

Oh come on, Adam. Things can be funny--even with crotch shots!--and have a point. MA's argument is that Mike Judge's movies usually have a point, and that she couldn't find a point in this one. Also, as the commenter above reminds you, you really need to know your reviewer and his or her approach to film criticism. I read reviews prior to watching films so I can gauge how I'd like to spend my money, as L.A. prices are exorbitant, and I read certain reviewers who jive with my tastes.

For example, MA is also not very accepting of unexcused misogyny in films, and that is something any reader of her reviews should know by now: if women are portrayed as irredeemably stereotypic manipulators or shrews in a film for no apparent (satirical or otherwise) reason, MA is going to call that film out on it, and quite possibly give the film a poor rating because of it.

I do agree with MA often (though I haven't always agreed with MA about comedies, e.g. I laughed all through Anchorman), but I generally find myself coming to this site because of her feminist perspective and her refusal to accept pointless film-making. I like when a critic demands that films have a point besides superficial entertainment, because (mass) entertainment and meaningfulness are not as mutually exclusive as the Hollywood executives would have us believe.

I haven't seen this movie yet, so I don't have an opinion. But I really loved Office Space, a film in which I found both humor and meaning through satire, so I have high expectations for Extract. We'll see if I agree with MA or not. I'm just saying: just because a reviewer wants a film with a crotch joke to have a point doesn't mean he or she is "uptight" or something. That's what critics are for: to critique, not just laugh along with everyone else at crotch joke after crotch joke and forget that he or she is screening the movie to write a *critical* review.

@Kate: That is surely a corollary to the Law of Spelling Flames (which always contain a spelling error).

@David Dent: FWIW, the novelist Frank Yerby claimed that he had, while trying to commit art, collected only rejection slips; so he set out deliberately to write the worst novel he possibly could, and behold, it was a bestseller.

This movie rocked.

No, it didn't.

With its cast, it had the potential to rock but it never really went anywhere.

It says something about how dull my Labor Day was that I actually broke down and saw this, hoping to see something that would prove MaryAnn wrong. But, no, I didn't.

One character seemed to be a parody of the Brad Pitt character in Burn After Reading and I would like to think that Judge was trying to go for the same effect that movie went for. Then again I hated that movie and so did almost everyone in my family so I'm guessing Judge was successful.

One of the keys to comedic material is that it's relatable to it's audience.

I actually once worked in a soda pop plant whose assembly line was similar to this movie's and I still hated this flick.

And not just because it brought back some bad memories. I would have forgiven the movie that if it had had any really imaginative sight gags or funny dialogue or even an original point to make but it didn't. Its funniest gag--which wasn't all that funny--was a direct steal from Office Space.

Tenuous, but here goes.

Playwright / filmmaker David Mamet says that the appeal of prayer is not that our prayers will be answered, but that down on our knees we admit our own powerlessness and helplessness, and we "arise refreshed."

Similarly, beneath everything else Mike Judge does is the simultaneous futility of ambition and the futility of NOT having an ambition.

In "King of the Hill," Hank's devotion to propane is simultaneously absurd and charming. All of Peggy's ambitions reek of desperation, yet it's a desperation to which we can all relate.

In "Office Space," Ron Livingston's anti-dream of "doing nothing" is alluring and sad. The co-worker who gets the huge settlement lives out his equally sad ambition of creating the "Jump to a Conclusion" game.

The petty tyrants throughout all of Judge's work - Lumberg, "Extract's" pot dealer, Step's apotheosis to floor manager - seem to be fighting off the bleakness of existence by a fanatical rule of a tiny, worthless kingdom.

So we come to "Extract," in which the ambitious and successful are unhappy (Bateman's Joel), the ambitious and struggling are unhappy (Mila Kunis pointedly never seems pleased or smug about any of her accomplishments), the un-ambitious are unhappy (Step's Pepsi-addicted half-brother is living the dream of "doing nothing" but doesn't seem pleased with himself and the assembly line griper isn't happy either).

(I also like that whenever Joel calls the gigolo, he is wearing the same clothes and sitting in an identical position on the same couch - another of Judge's losers with dreams of doing nothing.)

(Also, even though Kunis's femme fatale is way smarter than the homme fatale who seduces Joel's wife, it's debatable who is happier at the end.)

No one is happy in "Extract," except maybe the gigolo. No one has the answers. Everyone is kicking around, miserable, those who try and succeed, those who try and fail, those who do nothing and succeed, and those who do nothing and fail.

All the "happy resolution" musical cues are cut-off halfway through, pulling the rug out from under them. Except the last one, and as Joel decides to give up on his dream and put a smile on his face, it isn't so much because he's happy or resolved anything or found contentment in his lot, but because what else can he do?

It is the human condition to be helpless, miserable creatures, with only delusions of grandeur and ambition.

And so I for one, in admitting my powerlessness, left "Extract" refreshed and happy.