I'm a big fan of Mike Judge's other forays onto the big screen - Office Space and Idiocracy - and so I was looking forward to the next in his vein of "funny because they're true, but still ridiculous enough to make good entertainment" movies. They're movies in which things that happen feel like they could actually happen, unlike the world in which Apatow lives.
Extract stars Jason Bateman, perhaps best known for his role on Arrested Development, as Joel Reynolds, owner of an extract plant. Not only must he deal with unruly employees and the general stress of running a business, he hasn't had any extra curricular activities with his wife (Kristen Wiig of SNL) for quite some time and has the world's most annoying neighbor on top of that. His drinking buddy, a long haired Ben Affleck, comes up with a solution to his marital problems that involves having an affair with the new employee (Mila Kunis) and seemed like a good idea at the time. Mostly because at the time, the odd effects of horse tranquilizers were involved. Things for Joel just go downhill from there.
I was expecting hilarity, but was somewhat disappointed. Parts of this movie were funny, but it never really felt cohesive. It was more like a sketch comedy that failed in linking the sketches into the bigger picture they were supposed to be. There were certain parts that were gold, like the factory line women who would refuse to turn off the line when it got backed up because "why should they do their job when other people obviously weren't doing theirs?" I think we all know at least one person like that. Much of it, though, was just above forgettable. Maybe I'm being a bit harsh, since it wasn't a "bad" movie, per se, but Judge is capable of so much better.
** (2/5 stars)
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