“And the number one movie in the country was called “Ass.” And that’s all it was for ninety minutes. And it won Oscars…”
Our current society needs to be spoofed. In our current state it should analyzed, satirized, and cast into the darkness, because you’re all idiots, and you need to know that. You’re reality show watching, God fearing, literacy phobic, sadistic, consuming, ignorant drones, and someone needs to fill you in on that. “Idiocracy” is a step in the right direction as it’s a merciless satire on our society which is, by the way, currently run by pure idiots. It’s not surprising that “Idiocracy” wasn’t a hit because, risking repetition, movie goers are idiots as stated above, but it’s thankfully been praised among the movie geeks as a bonafide cult classic, a term that Mike Judge has become synonymous with.
He did so with “Office Space,” with “Beavis and Butthead,” and now “Idiocracy,” a movie that should be shown on screens all over America stating “THIS IS YOU” on the bottom of the screen in bold white letters. Maybe someone will realize: “Wow that’s me, alright.” Joe is a man who isn’t that bright and has officially volunteered for a freezing experiment for the Army to test the human bodies response to cryostases. But sadly, after some wild incidents, he awakens in American society to a world that’s basically been consumed by pure idiots. So yes, it’s not too far into the future. He’s forced into a world where his simple speech is considered a threat and possibly aggressive, and slang and valley girl talk are considered typical grammar.
This new world involves hit television series’ involving folks being hit in the groin, and entire television specials revolving around masturbation, and now he must attempt to live among these new denizens of this wasteland, now surrounded by waste and garbage, and find a way back home. Judge’s view on our world and its current intellectual status is so accurate it’s awfully frightening; go on any message board, try to sit through a movie in a public theater and you’ll see what Judge is getting at. Much of the gags here never seem so outlandish because it’s such a reflection on America’s current infatuation.
From being hit in the groin, and the aversion to folks who speak intellectually, Judge is never too subtle about his message. For almost ninety minutes he’s basically providing us with a glimpse at what we’ve become and can become, and “Idiocracy” is bound to last for years due to its sheer hilarity pulled from a potentially clunky premise. The aversion to “Idiocracy” at first was unusual and then obvious. Judge doesn’t present his message about our embracing of stupidity with mere undertones, he shouts it from the rooftops, and with it he creates a classic. Yes, Judge’s satire of our society is brilliant, there’s no argument about that. “Idiocracy” is a sharp, intelligent, and utterly hysterical scrutinizing of our current stupidity chic civilization and it’s sad this was never fully embraced, in the end. It’s a movie now, but in ten years it will be a historical documentary.