#147 Idiocracy

Even though I caught Borat's documentary last night, I'm pretty sure that Idiocracy is my favorite comedy this year.

The local art house theater here in Minneapolis hosted a midnight movie of the picture. They usually squander their screen on stuff like Back to the Future and Blue Velvet, awesome movies to be sure, but the kind of stuff you can rent or buy at pretty much every store in the country.

The one weekend that pretty much every moviegoer in the country was watching Sacha Baron Cohen's flick, they decided to screen Idiocracy. And despite this bone-headed programming the midnight screening enjoyed a nearly full house.

Idiocracy isn't perfect. But man, it's heartfelt. I'm sure that's not the first thing that comes to mind when you think of a movie about hand-jobs, prostitutes and monster trucks. But I'm serious about this.

Mike Judge is a keen observer of culture. And the reason I love this movie so much is that it's proof that there's someone else out there. Someone else who cringes every time they hear a slave-wage employee drone through a pre-scripted upsale before ringing up my order. Someone else who understands the pain and frustration of being called a fag because you like to read books.

I know. I'm a total homo for Mike Judge.

That doesn't change that Idiocracy is the most subversive, clever and imaginative comedy to almost be released in ages. The movie is layered knee-deep with jokes. Visual gags occupy every corner of every frame. And the flick's Planet of the Apes-style three act structure proves that this movie isn't just a series of sketches strung out to feature length. The movie has a plot. A feature, I'm beginning to fear, bores most comedy audiences.

As a special treat for Minneapolis audiences, the staff of the Uptown theater inadvertently added an extra layer of irony to the screening. The sound started to waver during the last scenes. I'm guessing the projectionist was asleep at the wheel. Just as the film's resolution unspooled, the movie just petered out. Literally. The narration slowed like a 12'' record sans spin. Then the screen went dark.

The audience laughed.

Could this be the purposeful end of the picture? Naw. The movie's not that conceptual. A staff obviously payed too little to care had, in their own special way, pointed out that Idiocracy wasn't just a science fiction-flavored comedy. By their negligence they reminded me, at least, that it's also a horror movie about the increasingly scary world that we live in every day.