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Editor's Note: This is the review you've all been waiting for!!! The unedited SMC!!! But I couldn't help implanting what I would have edited in as a demonstration. Please send any comments or criticisms to me at SMCEd@brunching.com. Finally, a movie which shows just how screwed up, dishonest and down right criminal most of today's workers truly are. [Dangling something -- not sure what...] This film is so true, so real, it should become mandatory viewing for any new executive. They need to be warned. The average salaried employee can do some horrible things! [And contractors are angels?] This film, I should really call it an educational video, is the chilling drama Office Space. [Fragment embedded in a sentence.] It's the first live-action entity from Mike Judge, the creator of Beavis and Butthead. This time, instead of showing us all how dangerous banality in youth can be if left unchecked, he has drawn a gripping tale of corporate malaise gone to the extreme. ["Corporate Malaise"? A corporation with a tummy ache?] Meet Peter Gibbons. He's a model employee, happily providing a need for the company, when suddenly he turns ugly. He loses all respect for his rightful betters, his work effort just falls to pieces, and he plots, with two disgruntled possibly mental workers, a scheme to rob the company of millions. [There are so many things wrong with this sentence that I can't even begin.] Every executive in the nation should watch this film and study Peter Gibbons. Do they see any of these tell-tale signs in their own employees? Are mass firings in order? The moral of this film, if I may step into the head of creator Mike Judge for a moment, is to always be prepared. [I saw this movie and this isn't the moral. As a matter of fact, "Be Prepared" is not a moral lesson: it's a bit of good advice.] For anything. Act first, worry about the repercussions later. If you have suspicions about an employee, don't wait for it to grow into something dangerous and possibly postal, fire the employee quickly, without remorse. [Should have a semi-colon between 'postal' and 'fire.'] Do all that you can to remind your workers how important you are, and how their days should be filled with thoughts of making your life better. The film is funny, very funny. It follows in the tradition of classic instructional videos that know that if the audience is laughing, their getting the message. [Homonym.] And laugh you will. Humor o'plenty abounds in this farce [Cute Irish accent not funny.], thanks to sharp writing, great performances by the cast (even Jennifer Aniston has funny moments [Oh, so not true.]) and the classic subject matter of the piece. We can all relate to the situation, we've all worked with these slackers, and we love to watch their world crumble around them. I must take time out to single out one great performance. Stephen Root as Milton is nothing short of hysterically funny. [Too over the top] I can't describe how incredibly wonderful he was, except to say that he was incredibly wonderful. I mean really, really wonderful. Incredibly so. [Literature incarnate, eh?] In short, Office Space is both very funny, and highly educational. Once again, I encourage all executives to see it. Know that your employees will be seeing it, and they may be getting ideas, so you need to defend yourself by learning as much as you can from this movie. I'm giving Office Space 4 Babylons. Go see it. You'll thank me. [Should have reduced this entire review to "Go see it" and put the audience out of their misery.] Office Space |
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