functional illiteracy

Idiocracy (2006)
Directed by Mike Judge
Gore Capitalism Series #11

We’ve entered the comic relief portion of Professor Daniel R. Quiles’ programming, in what’s a welcome reprieve from scenes of mass murder, violent sex work, and self-destructive doppelgängers. Mike Judge’s Idiocracy is an amusing exercise, an oft-times smug, sometimes empathetic, and always entertaining examination of a collapsed society. While a privileged, intelligent couple determines that they’re not fiscally prepared to bear children into the world, another couple - of shall we say meager upbringing - opts to procreate ad infinitum. This kind of reductive observation, in the hands of a less qualified filmmaker, would have been disastrous. But with Judge, he builds on this notion, observing the systemic qualities in capitalism , government, and science that promotes a separation of wealth and class. What follows is a society run for idiots, by idiots. It can be argued (somewhat convincingly) that this is all low-hanging fruit in a post-Trump world, but I’d suggest there’s more going on here than the superficial, prophetic qualities it exhibits. 

Joe and Rita (Luke Wilson and Maya Rudolph) are selected to take part in a government experiment involving cryogenic freezing, intended to observe the body’s decline over a year span. Things go comically awry and it ends up being a 500 year slumber, where Joe awakens to a society that’s been tattooed with barcodes, overrun by violent idiots. Joe and Rita were selected for the experiment for their quote unquote averageness, with their cumulative IQ barely scraping the triple digits,  but the two end up being the most intelligent people on the planet, whereupon government agents (including a muscle-bound, meat-head president ripped right out of 80s WWF programming), demand that they solve all the world’s problems. Key to this is the planet’s inability to grow crops, whereupon a dust bowl has overtaken the globe (think Interstellar, but funny). Wilson’s comic adeptness, as a lowly “Average Joe” type, is exceedingly well-realized. And while Rudolph doesn’t have a whole lot to do here, her role remains pivotal in establishing some of the broadly misogynistic qualities that emerge in this world. 

While prophetic, I don’t think Idiocracy quite reaches the heights of other films of its ilk, like Paul Verhoeven’s Robocop, for example. Judge’s formalism can best be described as fine, which may or may not be a result of the film’s limited budget. The ideas here are intriguing, however, particularly in relation to the broader social consequences of permitting corporate entities into our lives. None of this comes across as novel per se, but instead roots the obvious into something so comically ludicrous that it’s hard not to appreciate the gumption in going that far to begin with. Someone like Adam McKay could’ve easily taken this material and made it into a didactic rendering on the plights of modern society; with Judge, he’s articulating something more cautionary without lecturing. I’m infinitely curious as to what Sayak Valencia thinks of this material, insofar that it suggests a violent future propagated by established corporate entities; cartels dressed up in suits.