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Napoleon Dynamite (2004)
Director:
Jared Hess
Genre:
Comedy
Studio:
Fox Searchlight
Check out the Official Website
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When Wes Anderson opens up a new scene in the recent comedy classic "The Royal Tennenbaums," the camera pans by a book containing the film's screenplay, directly referencing what the audience is about to see. It's a brilliant narrative conceit and one that speaks volume as to why the film works so well.
It's all about the details. Anderson takes almost ridiculous pains to assure that every tell-tale nook and cranny of a character, from their funky facial hair to their green velvet jacket to the highly pornographic contents of their apartment, is in perfect syncopation with what we understand that character to be through their actions and dialogue. Enter "Napoleon Dynamite," a low-budget comic offering from former Idahoan (Idaho? No you da ho!) Jared Hess that's informed and inspired by the genius of Anderson.
Hess tells the story of "Napoleon Dynamite," a gawky red-headed 'fro-sporting teenager from the small town of Preston, Idaho. Dynamite's family is nearly as awkward as he is. He lives with a hellion of a grandmother, who keeps a pet llama and disappears for spells to go off-roading, and a pale, weak, effeminate 30 year-old brother who spends his life at home absorbed in back-in-the-day style internet chat rooms. Dynamite's friends consist of Pedro, a Mexican immigrant who wears a toupee and a wide variety of really pimp Western wear, and Deb, the local geek gal who works at Glamour Shots and is crazy in love with Dynamite's many masterful moves.
The film, which is being marketed heavily through Fox Searchlight with multiple preview screenings, free T-shirts and a prizes for frequent viewers of the film, is based on a super low-budget short also put together by Hess called Peluca, which did remarkably well at Slamdance. With no bankable stars (except possibly Aaron Ruell from The Drew Carey Show), and a lead character that's deliberately awkward and unattractive, it's doubtful that the film's theatrical run will be either long or particularly profitable, though it just might build up enough of a cult following to do well on DVD.
Which is a shame.
This is certainly one of the most original comedies of the year, and it deserves attention. Like Judah Friedlander's Toby Radcliff in "American Splendor," Jon Heder's Napoleon Dynamite is the type of addictive nerd you're bound to be imitating after seeing the film. Open-mouthed to the point of looking heavily sedated and full of endlessly outdated dialogue, he goes on about his skills with nun-chukkas, keeps it "frickin' sweet" and has a strange infatuation with unicorns and "ligers."
It's as if Hess and his wife Jerusha have been saving up the artifacts of a recently perished language in a vacuum, only to let them out for the film. The eighties references come fast and fierce, and at times I felt like a target market, bombarded with images of Zoobahs, BMX bike ramps and the long-lost sport of tetherball.
The only thing being sold though, it seems, is a lot of laughs and an old-fashioned, highly satisfying tale of an immensely likable posse of geeks conquering a world of bland normalniks. Will the genre ever go stale?
...
Written by Richard Sharp
Review Date: May 31, 2004
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