Idiocracy

Idiocracy
Promotional poster for Idiocracy
Directed by	Mike Judge
Written by	Mike Judge Etan Cohen
Produced by	Mike Judge Elysa Koplovitz Michael Nelson
Starring	Luke Wilson Maya Rudolph
Narrated by	Earl Mann
Cinematography	Tim Suhrstedt
Edited by	David Rennie
Music by	Theodore Shapiro
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release dates	September 3, 2006
Running time	84 min.
Country	USA
Language	English
Box office	$444,000 (U.S. Domestic)

Idiocracy is a 2006 comedy film directed by Mike Judge. It stars Luke Wilson and Maya Rudolph. A dark comedy, it features an "Average Joe" and a prostitute subjected to a military experiment in hibernation, from which they are to awaken in one year. However, they are forgotten and instead emerge 500 years later in a world where dysgenics and cultural anti-intellectualism have resulted in a uniformly stupid humanity.

Synopsis

Template:Spoilers As the movie begins, vignettes and a voiceover illustrate that as unintelligent people enthusiastically outbreed intelligent people, future society will become inevitably and irreversibly dumber.

In 2005, Army librarian Joe Bauers (Wilson), a completely average man, and Rita (Rudolph), a loyal prostitute who is very afraid of her pimp, Upgrayedd (spelled with two D's for a "double dose of his pimping power"), are selected as guinea pigs for a year-long secret military hibernation project. The pair are sealed into coffin-like chambers. Unfortunately, after a scandal in which the officer in charge is arrested on prostitution charges in connection with Upgrayedd, the experiment is forgotten, the military base is demolished, and a Fuddruckers (renamed Buttfuckers in the future) is built on the site.

Five hundred years later, Joe and Rita's containers (unearthed in The Great Garbage Avalanche) open, reviving them. Joe lands in the apartment of Frito (Shepard), an idiot. Feeling woozy, Joe visits the hospital where Dr. Lexus (Long) diagnoses him as simply "retarded". Lexus panics that Joe has no bar code tattoo and can't be scanned for payment, while Joe panics that 500 years have passed, and the world he sees out the window is falling apart. Joe flees but is arrested at a Carl's Jr. vending booth for failing to pay the hospital bill, and for being unscannable.

Joe's defense lawyer at trial turns out to be Frito, who stupidly helps convict him. In prison, a poorly-designed I.D. machine records Joe's name as "Not Sure" and barcodes him. During a mandatory I.Q. test, Joe realizes just how stupid humanity has become. Easily escaping the prison, Joe returns to Frito's apartment and asks if a time machine exists to help him return to the past. Frito says there is, but will help only after Joe promises him billions of dollars in interest on a bank account Joe will open in the past.

Enroute to the time machine, Joe, Rita and the lawyer enter a city-sized Costco, where Joe is arrested again when his new barcode is scanned. Instead of going to jail, Joe is taken to the White House: President Camacho (Crews) has seen Joe's I.Q. test and recruits him to solve the world's food shortages, crippled economy, mountains of garbage, etc. Joe learns that water has been replaced by Brawndo (a sports drink "with electrolytes"), even for crop irrigation, causing the food shortage.

After Joe reintroduces the use of water (now only used in toilets) for crops, the giant Brawndo Corporation's stock plummets, causing massive unemployment. The angry population riots, and Joe is sentenced to a Running Man/Mad Max/demolition derby style "rehabilitation". Meanwhile Rita sees crops sprouting in the fields. To save Joe, she bribes a TV cameraman to show the crops to the world, with Frito going along. But before they reach the field, they are sidetracked by a sale at Starbucks, now a brothel chain. It is only after Frito knocks out the cameraman for calling him a "fag" that he remembers his job. The President sees the thriving new plants on the stadium big screens and pardons Joe just as he is about to be incinerated by a flame thrower. Soon afterwards, Joe becomes the Vice-President and eventually, President. He abandons his plans to return to the past so he can work on saving the future.

At the celebration, Joe learns that the "Time Masheen" is just a bad amusement park history ride where Charlie Chaplin is shown as the leader of the Nazi party, dinosaurs act as armed forces, and the U.N. is called "Un", having "Un-Nazied the world". After the credits, we see a third hibernation capsule open, releasing a snappily dressed Upgrayedd into the world.

Cast

• Luke Wilson as Army librarian Private Joe Bauers, an average guy
• Maya Rudolph as Rita, a prostitute working for Upgrayedd
• Dax Shepard as Frito Pendejo, public defender
• Terry Crews as President Camacho, porn star and champion wrestler
• Brendan Hill as Secretary of Energy
• David Herman as Secretary of State
• Sara Rue as Attorney General
• Stephen Root as Judge Hank "The Hangman" BMW
• Thomas Haden Church as Brawndo CEO
• Justin Long as Dr. Lexus
• Andrew Wilson as Beef Supreme
• Jennifer Vasquez as Camacho's Groupie (uncredited)
• Scarface (rapper) as Upgrayedd

Production

Early working titles included The United States of Uhh-merica and 3001. Test screenings around March 2005 produced unofficial reports of poor audience reactions. After some re-shooting in the summer of 2005, a U.K. test screening in August produced a report of a positive impression.

Release issues

As of February 2005 the film's scheduled release date was August 5th, 2005, according to Mike Judge. In April 2006, a release date was set for September 1, 2006. In August, numerous articles revealed that release was to be put on hold indefinitely. Idiocracy was released as scheduled but only in seven cities (Los Angeles, Atlanta, Toronto, Chicago, Dallas, Houston and Mike Judge's hometown, Austin), and expanded to only 125 theaters, not the usual wide release of 2500-3000 theaters. According to the Austin American-Statesman , 20th Century Fox, the film's distributor, did nothing to promote the movie — while posters were released to theatres, no movie trailers, television ads, or press kits for media outlets were provided. The film was not screened for critics. Lack of concrete information from 20th Century Fox led to speculation that Fox may have actively tried to keep the film from being seen by a large audience, while fulfilling a contractual obligation for theatrical release prior to a DVD release, according to Ryan Pearson of AP. In the New York Times Dan Mitchell argued that Fox might be shying away from a cautionary tale about low-intelligence dysgenics. John Patterson of The Guardian suggests it is a result of the film's anti-corporate message, noting that in the film Starbucks now delivers handjobs, and the motto of Carl's Jr. has devolved from "Don't Bother Me. I'm Eating." to "Fuck You! I'm Eating!"; a Carl's Jr. vending machine cheats a customer, and Fuddruckers' name gradually morphs into "Buttfuckers", the fictional Brawndo corporation buys the F.D.A. and the F.C.C, and the Fox News Channel is depicted in unflattering newscasts (both Fox News Channel and 20th Century Fox are owned by the Rupert Murdoch-controlled News Corporation).

Reception

Idiocracy generated mostly positive reviews, although early reviews were few due to the lack of advance screenings for critics. It received a 68% "fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes (though it was only reviewed by 31 critics as of March 17 2007), and received mostly positive reviews on the Internet Movie Database. The A.V. Club gave the film a grade of A-.

Box office receipts totalled $444,093 in 135 theaters in the U.S.

DVD release

The movie was released on DVD on January 9, 2007 with fullframe and widescreen aspect ratios, deleted scenes, English and Spanish spoken language tracks, and subtitles in English, Spanish, and French.

Trivia

• In the first scene with Clevon, where he says "Shit! I got too many damn kids!", the beer can is a "Penn Pavel's Beer" which is the same fictional brand as that found in The Truman Show.

• In the photographs shown toward the beginning of the film, Upgrayedd is portrayed by Scarface of the Geto Boys. In Mike Judge's previous film, Office Space, he had used songs from the Geto Boys, including the song "Still" from the scene where the office workers smash the printer.

• The explanation that Upgrayedd is spelled with two D's for a "double dose" of pimpin' comes from the documentary American Pimp, in which a real-life pimp calling himself Rosebudd offers that explanation for the spelling of his own name.

• The orange prison uniform includes orange crocs Cayman shoes.

• Apparently, none of the shirts or pants have buttons or zippers. This was likely intended to illustrate humanity's inability to operate something as simple as a zipper or a button.

See also

• The Marching Morons C.M. Kornbluth, 1951. Science fiction story about dysgenic breeding.
• Futurama episode The Day the Earth Stood Stupid
• Sleeper (film)
• Harrison Bergeron (Kurt Vonnegut Short story and TV movie)

External links

Scenes

Scenes from the opening of the film, from Fox Home Video website: Two family trees, Clevon's family grows, Joe gets a new job, Project meeting, Joe & Rita enter hibernation.

Release

• Open Letter to Fox re: IDIOCRACY!!! Ain't It Cool News. Quint, September 2, 2006. On the film's mishandling.

• Mike Judge Is Getting Screwed (Again) Esquire. Brian Raftery, June 1, 2006. Interview with Mike Judge about the film's mishandling.

• Time for Mike Judge to go Indie Cinematical. Jette Kernion, Oct 22nd 2006. On the film's mishandling.

• Dude, Where's My Film? Time. Joel Stein, September 10, 2006. On the film's mishandling.

• A Paucity of Publicity for 'Idiocracy' NPR's Day to Day. Nihar Patel, September 8, 2006. Audio report on the marketing of the film. Includes comments by a veteran Fox marketing employee.

Reviews

• 3001 Screenplay Review FilmJerk.com. Edward Havens, January 29th, 2004. Positive review of the "3001" screenplay.

• Idiocracy Review FilmJerk.com. Edward Havens, September 4, 2006. Positive review of the film.

• Idiocracy Review Scifi.com. Mike Szymanski, September 1, 2006. Review of an early edit; refers to the year 2974.

• Idiocracy Review Reel Film Reviews. David Nusair, September 1, 2006. Positive review.

• Idiocracy Review Not Coming to a Theater Near You, Rumsey Taylor, January 2007. Positive review.

• Idiocracy Review Cinematical. Jette Kernion, Septembe 2, 2006. Positive review.

• Idiocracy Review Austin360.com. Sarah Lidner, September 1, 2006. Mixed review.

• Idiocracy Review LATimes.com. Carina Chocano, September 4, 2006. Positive review.

• The Movie Hollywood Doesn't Want You To See Slate Magazine. Reihan Salam, September 29, 2006. Positive review.