NAPOLEON DYNAMITE

by Kevin Koehler

During the 19th century, Bethlem Psychiatric Hospital became a popular London attraction, particularly on the first Tuesday of every month when admission was free. All other days, visitors paid a penny to look into the cells of the insane and watch them fight and fornicate. Some tourists brought long rods to antagonize the patients and precipitate an entertaining response.

Today, we no longer poke lunatics with sticks. Don't have to, as there are films like Napoleon Dynamite that do the poking for us and then record it for posterity. All we have to do is look, point, and laugh.

This would normally be the point where I describe the plot, except Napoleon Dynamite doesn't really have a plot. Geek shows don't have plots, just a collection of freaks performing antisocial grotesquerie. This time, the carnival has set up shop in rural Preston, Idaho. Come watch Napoleon pack his pockets with tater tots. Watch Napoleon in the chicken coop. Watch Napoleon seduce a classmate with a sketch. Watch Napoleon dance.

While the film ostensible takes place in the present (that being 2004), it and its characters are obsessed with the past. "Don't you ever wish you could go back, with all the knowledge you have now" asks Uncle Rico (Jon Gries). Writer/director Jared Hess obviously does, though its unclear what he's learned in the meantime. Napoleon Dynamite takes place in a time warp (epitomized by Rico's gullible purchase of a broken time machine on eBay, a parable for the movie itself); it's more of a museum of pop culture anthropology than a fully-realized motion picture. Trapper Keepers, tether ball, Tupperware, and countless other artifacts of the 70s and 80s are all fetishized in the hopes we will mistake nostalgic minutia for wit and an obnoxious imbecile for something resembling a human being.

What is there to identify with in Napoleon Dynamite? Every time he is beaten, headlocked, or thrown into a locker, we chuckle: there is something about him that not only deserves to be humiliated but wants to be. Napoleon Dynamite makes us the bully, not the bullied, a bizarre piece of masochism from Hess whose faux-redeeming ending can't undo eighty minutes of figurative wedgie and latent racism - note how the film's only latinos and blacks are incorporated into Napoleon's coterie of half-wits. This is empowering for whom, exactly? Not the lunatics, but perhaps people with sticks.

Interesting footnote: A year after its release, the Idaho state legislature proposed a resolution that commended Napoleon Dynamite and its filmmakers. House Concurrent Resolution No. 29 "recognizes the vision, talent and creativity" of Jared and (wife/co-writer) Jerusha Hess, their promotion of tater tots ("Idaho's most famous export"), and the manner in which Napoleon and Pedro's friendship "has furthered multiethnic relationships." The resolution passed 69-0.

© Pretentious Musings. This review may not be reprinted, in whole or in part, without the express consent of its author.