EXTRACT (2009, Blu-ray released December 22, 2009 – MSRP $39.99)
I like Mike Judge‘s work a lot. I really do. He has an uncanny ability to distill the character of a community or sub-cluture down into a tight, little quirky film. Most famously in the cult hit Office Space but also in years of his animated TV show, King of the Hill. His latest film is called Extract and it’s more of what Judge does best – a look at regular people working regular jobs with a focus on the minutiae of their day-to-day existence and a little bit of grifting thrown in, just to keep things interesting.
As I said off the top, I like Judge’s work a lot. And while there’s a lot of good stuff going on in Extract it just isn’t the type of film that will grab you by the lapels and refuse to let go. The script is well crafted. The cast is phenomenal. And everything in the film seems to cohere and move along quite nicely. But, as is common in Judge’s stories, none of the characters are desperate enough to overcome the obstacles in their way. There’s barely any tension here. A lot of apathy but not much tension. And, as we all know, all dramatic moments thrive on tension. In most cases (like every week on King of the Hill) Judge can make it work – compensating with his trademark style of humour within social commentary. But it doesn’t quite come together here.
Jason Bateman leads an outstanding cast as Joel, a business owner who seems bored with his life. He’s keen on retiring, selling off his flavour extract company and devoting his life to putting the verve back into his dull, failing marriage to wife Suzie (Kristen Wiig). Just as this looks to become a reality, one of his workers is injured and threatens to sue, a beautiful young grifter (Mila Kunis) appears on the scene to take advantage and Joel gets into a whole mess of trouble with drugs, a gigolo and Ben Affleck (for real!) You can see how this sounds like it would amount to a laugh-riot of a film on paper. But it just never quite makes the grade. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a whole lot to love here. Bateman, Wiig and crew give subtle, textured performances. They’re wonderful. And the story is quite a nice little picture of small town, suburban life, pushed along by characters that feel fairly real. The problem is that nothing here is really all that funny. And that’s kind of what you want from this film, what the marketing has led us to expect from it. A few chuckles. A laugh. A good time. But most of the “funny” moments feel forced or rehashed (in particular, Joel’s pesky neighbour Nathan, whose speech patterns are a retread of Gary Cole‘s famous Bill Lumbergh character from Office Space.) And the drama isn’t dramatic enough to be fulfilling. I enjoyed Extract well enough. But I probably won’t be watching the disc again anytime soon.
Speaking of the Blu-ray, it manages to deliver an audio and video presentation equivalent to the film itself – perfectly enjoyable but not groundbreaking by any stretch of the imagination. This is no doubt the best Extract will ever look and sound on home video but there’s nothing to write home about here. The blacks are all right but not as deep as they could be, the colours accurate while not terribly brilliant and the detail acceptable. Likewise, the DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio track is perfectly serviceable – clean and clear but nowhere near as enveloping or dynamic as it could have been. Sigh…
Rounding out the disc are a small handful of special features, the highlight of which is an 11-minute behind-the-scenes featurette that’s fairly entertaining and revealing, for the limited time afforded it. The Extract Blu-ray disc also features a deleted scene and almost 5-minutes of extended scenes that you can safely skip.
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