Directed by: Mike Judge
Starring: Jason Bateman, Mila Kunis, Kristen Wiig, Ben Affleck
Other Actors of Note: J.K. Simmons, Clifton Collins Jr., David Koechner, Gene Simmons, Beth Grant
Plot: Joel, the owner of an extract manufacturing plant, constantly finds himself in precarious situations that steadily worsen by the minute. First, his soon-to-be floor manager acquires a serious injury in a machine malfunctioning accident that subsequently endangers the wellbeing of his company. Second, his personal life doesn't fair much better when he takes the advice of his bartending friend Dean during a drug-induced brainstorming session on how to test his wife's faithfulness. Finally, compounding these catastrophes is new employee Cindy, who happens to be a scam artist intent on milking the company for all its worth. Now, Joel must attempt to piece his company and his marriage back together all while trying to figure out what he's really after in life. Taken from www.imdb.com.
Mike Judge is a masterfully clever writer who has made an impact on the comedy world with MTV's "Beavis and Butthead" and his animated dramady about life in Texas "King of the Hill", but no Mike Judge project has ever recieved the same amount of love as the 1999 sleeper hit "Office Space." This clever satire of an office environment starring Rob Livingston, Jennifer Anniston, and Gary Cole is a beloved comedy classic 10 years later.
After Judge's good but lackluster "Idiocracy" people were waiting for the next big thing from the man behind "Office Space." Soon trailers for "Extract" came out and posters appearing with the proclamation that Mike Judge was "going back to work." Everything that "Extract" had to offer seemed to be an "Office Space"-style send-up of the factory-warehouse industry. An industry just as, if not moreso, deserving of a satire as office work.
Unfortunately, "Extract" is not that movie. It's about Joel (Jason Bateman) a married man who has brought his vanilla extract business up from the ground. Joel is having problems with his increasingly more passionless wife Suzie(Kristen Wiig).
Joel finds out from his second in command Brian (J.K. Simmons) that General Mills is interested in buying the company. But problems start when employee "Step" (Clifton Collins Jr.) loses one of his testicles in an accident.
Con-woman and oppurtunist Cindy (Mila Kunis) befriends Step and convinces him to sue the company with the help of an ambulance-chasing lawyer Joe Adler. (Gene Simmons in a send-up of Texas attorney and very angry man Jim Adler: The Texas Hammer.)
As Joel deals with the threat of losing his company he has to deal with a mess of his own creation, as in a drunken moment of weakness he hired a gigolo (Dustin Milligan) to seduce his wife so that he could cheat on her guilt-free.
Have you seen "Arrested Development?" Well then you'll be glad to know that Michael Bluth has now moved to Texas and started an artificial flavoring company. Jason Bateman literally plays the same character that put him on the map (no, not "Teen Wolf", dumbass) and while this isn't necessarily a bad thing it's not that great either.
Bateman does have a talent for making the shitty things that Joel does seem excusable and you really do feel like he's a victim of circumstance rather than a jerk. At times this movie is painful to watch just because you know there's no good way for to make it out of this movie.
Mila Kunis is boring as the con-woman Cindy, still managing to nudge herself slightly ahead of Kristin Wiig's bad Jennifer Anniston impersonation. While neither actress is entirely important to the story they both could have done more with their characters.
Clifton Collins Jr. does a truly understated performance as Step, the self-important redneck that you've worked with in any warehouse/factory industry job you've ever done. Collins plays white trash so well that anyone not familiar with him can't even tell he's Latino. (Which considering he's played some of the most atypical Latino characters in film that's pretty impressive.) Beth Grant, J.K. Simmons, Javier Gutierrez, and T.J. Miller all give perfect performances as other industry-specific archetypes (The racist old lady with horrible fashion sense, the manager who can't remember anyone's name, the quiet Mexican who does his job but gets blamed for everything, and the dumb ass forklift driver respectively.)
Ben Affleck shows why he was never meant for leading man material as Dean, easily the best performance he's done in years as the drug-dealing man-pimp/bartender and Joel's best friend. Affleck has several great memorable lines and is out of the way enough to make his screen time enjoyable.
Of course, the real scene stealer in the movie is David Koechner (AKA that guy who's in, like, every movie) as Joel's neighbor Nathan. Nathan is "that guy" who won't shut the hell up, bothers you constantly, and never seems to take the hint that you don't like him. Koechner plays this role so pitch-perfectly that all his scenes are brilliantly hilarious.
Dustin Milligan plays a stereotypical stupid man-whore. That's really all that needs to be said about that.
Now as I said above, this is NOT "Office Space" in a factory. While there is some great satire of the industry, the job is a very small and unimportant part of the movie. The movie is more a satire of life in general with several wonderful archetypes played perfectly.
In many ways "Extract" is an extended episode of "King of the Hill" where the entire world is satire and the story is playing as a series of unfortunate events happening to the main character. But more than anything, "Extract" feels like Mike Judge doing The Coen Brothers.
The situation shows Joel as the great things in his life have started to pique and he's heading in a downward acr into a series of increasingly more horrible situations. By midway through the movie you're wondering if Joel is even going to survive the movie at all. But then just as you second-guess things the narrative takes a turn and everything starts to go good again.
If you fell for it, don't fell bad, even though Judge is famous for this bait-and-switch method in almost every episode of "King of the Hill" it took me by surprise as well. Perhaps it was the Coen-lite feel of the movie that threw me off, but I honestly expected the movie to end with him being hit by a bus. This just shows that Judge's take on mankind is decidedly more optimistic than Joel and Ethan Coen's.
The movie has some great bits and is ultimately satisfying but those of you coming to see something of "Office Space" caliber will be disappointed.
"Extract" is a good movie, certainly better than Judge's previous directoral effort "Idiocracy", but still a far cry from the comedic magic he captured with "Office Space." Still, Mike Judge is on the way back up and I look forward to seeing more.
I give "Extract" a 4 out of 5. It's good, not great, give it a rent.
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