Dr. Pseudonym on Napoleon Dynamite

LYRC is proud to present what will hopefully be a fantastically successful installment series: “Dr. Pseudonym Reviews A DVD From Under A Rock Someplace”. Every so often Dr. Pseudonym will hold forth on a randomly selected piece of cinematic ephemera. The selection for this inaugural installment is Napoleon Dynamite. Enjoy.

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I can't see where there's any room for debate about this movie – this is a funny movie! Check the roster of cinematic goodness, yo:

- Hands down the funniest, cleverest opening credit sequence ever committed to celluloid. Some say spelling names in food and whatnot is so Nickelodeon but I say it's the sort of dorky that's still funny and cool. And I appreciated the two full minutes that I was shown the casting director's name printed on a faux library card because casting a middle-aged dude as the school bully was brilliant and I need to know who to send my fan letter to. And who's brave idea was it to even have a bully in this high school movie? Totally brilliant.

- A high school movie that uses the contest for a class president as the conclusive dramatic device? Now I've seen everything. Some say It's about as fresh as anything that's been fucked a mazillion times. But I say if a mazillion is only a fraction of the number of times I've yet to see it over the remaining years of my life, the suspense is already killing me. How is that nerd ever going to become class president? Pull up your oxygen tanks and find out.

- How about the tracking shot from the slow-motion feet of the protagonist to show off his killer new outfit? Ever seen that before? Not me. Apparently this shot requires a very special camera that is attached to a phone line so that only the world's laziest, most uncreative directors can call it in all the while blowing their corporate overlords back in Burbank.

- That little musical sequence where the nerds slap up their campaign posters over those of their rivals all over the school. It's very exciting. And almost as entertaining as the musical sequence where they go on a shopping spree and Napoleon keeps emerging from the dressing room in outrageous outfits as Pedro shakes his head, shrugs, mime's throwing up before finally giving a big grin and two thumbs up. Wait, no, I must've seen that somewhere else. Still, the big grin and two thumbs up is there. Right back at you, Pedro!

- You've got to give the movie some credit for sidestepping convention in its treatment of farmers; usually Hollywood depicts farmers as hardworking citizen exemplars of the Jeffersonian ideal. This is bullshit, and Napoleon Dynamite at least has the courage to show them as the dirty, ignorant, snaggle-tooth hillbilly pig-people that they really are. Why weren't there any ugly old stupid chicken farmers in Dazed and Confused? Sure would've made that movie a lot funnier.

- Napoleon Dynamite keeps his eyes closed all the time! It's so funny because it's so true! I totally talked with my eyes closed when I was going through that awkward stage. And just thinking about his funny name is making me laugh right now. What a weird name, Napoleon Dynamite. I wonder how he got that weird name. So funny.

- His geek brother goes totally gangsta! That was funny too.

In short, the movie does a lot more in two hours than Freaks and Geeks managed to do in a whole season. That series totally blows. Napolean Dynamite, on the other hand, is a whole lot of crazy fun, a story we can all relate to, told in a very unique, funny and meaningful way.