Idiocracy

As part of a U.S. Army experiment in maintaining stand-by troops under suspended animation, a private Joe average-type (Luke Wilson) and a common hooker (SNL’s Maya Rudolph) are put on ice for a one-year trial … and with it under the eye of the Army, source of such useful acronyms for catastrophe as SNAFU and FUBAR, it isn’t all that surprising when the pair wake up after a 500-year delay. It’s also not surprising that in the interim, unnatural selection has run rampant, resulting in a society of utter and complete idiots that make the two look like Einstein and Vos Savant on a date. Mike Judge’s biting social satire was completely discarded by the studio on its technical release, not a big surprise in itself with the brunt of the barbs aimed at Fox’s bread-and-butter audience. As a comedy, the results are better than expected from the dude behind King of the Hill, with a dystopian view of the future that at times seems far more likely than that of more staid projections.