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| Napoleon Dynamite isn’t like anyone else in his hometown of Preston, Idaho. In fact he is not like anyone you’ve ever known. A peculiar looking boy who lives with his quad-bike riding grandmother, 31 year-old brother Kip and his ultra-vain Uncle Rico. The family is all too caught-up in their own lives to give Napoleon the time of day and left to his own devices, he tries to impress girls at his high-school by helping his best-friend Pedro, become student-body president.
A quirky comedy full of high-school geeks and nerds, Napoleon Dynamite can be perfectly summed up in the words of award-winning British comedian Matt Lucas of Little Britain fame: “Jon Heder’s performance is one of the funniest things you’ll ever see.” Simon Pegg, of Shaun of the Dead, adds “Hilarious, compulsive and beautiful; my favorite film of the decade.”
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Here's what our members thought of this title. 5 stars = very good, 1 star = poor.
 |  | "Girls only want boyfriends who have great skills. You know, like nunchuck skills, bow-hunting skills, computer hacking skills..."
A priceless celebration of nerdery in all of its awkward glory, Napoleon Dynamite is a fresh and distinctive rites-of-passage comedy with a classic cast of oddballs and many memorable comic surprises. Made for just $200,000, its incredible success at the Sundance Film Festival and enormous popularity with audiences worldwide, is further proof that if the script's right, it doesn't take millions of dollars to make a funny movie. "Sixteen pages into the script," remembers co-star Jon Gries, "I was laughing out loud. I didn't need to read another page. I called my manager and said, ‘Yeah, I'll do this. I'll do this for nothing. I don't care. I love it.'"
"Celebrating the nerd liberates so many people," says 24-year-old first-time feature director Jared Hess, who wrote the screenplay with his wife Jerusha. Set in his home town of Preston, Idaho, a white bread community living a good twenty years behind the rest of us, Hess's story focuses most closely on the trials and tribulations of its underdog hero, Napoleon. "This is me looking back on how awkward I was in high school," he admits, "and being able to laugh about it. I even wore moon boots and Hammer pants to school one time, which was pretty dorky."
"I have to accept the fact that I may be known for the rest of my life as the guy who plays the geek," says actor Jon Heder, amazing in the title role. "I don't know if I'll ever be able to top that character." Describing Napoleon as an awkward teenager is a bit like labeling WWII a minor skirmish. The way he talks. The way he moves. He's so out of synch with the world around him, it's like he's from another dimension. Certainly his hair is, a frizzy creation large enough to spot from space. Irritation is his signature emotion. He doesn't really look at people, just down at the ground, and he loves drawing unicorns. Asked to describe a current event in class, Napoleon's grasp on reality is revealed for what it is (tenuous, at best): "Last week, Japanese scientists placed explosive detonators at the bottom of Lake Loch Ness to blow Nessie out of the water. Sir Godfrey of the Nessie Alliance summoned the help of Scotland's local wizards to cast a protective spell over the lake and its local residents and all those who seek for the peaceful existence of our underwater ally." Seeing how Napoleon reacts to others, and how others react to him, is one of the principal pleasures of this movie.
Meeting his family and friends is another. Social misfits all, they make Napoleon seem slightly less abnormal. Older brother Kip (Aaron Ruell) is as puny as a man can be before disappearing completely. Addicted to chatrooms and generally useless, his take on the world is even odder than Napoleon's. "Don't be jealous that I've been chatting online with babes all day," he says. "Besides, we both know that I'm training to be a cage fighter…" Stranger still is Uncle Rico (Jon Gries), a wig-wearing door-to-door breast enhancements salesman who lives in a van and endlessly videotapes himself throwing a football in a vain attempt to recapture his lost youth. "How much you wanna make a bet I can throw a football over them mountains?"
What story there is revolves around Napoleon's efforts to get his dead-eyed best friend Pedro (Efren Ramirez) elected class president, leading to one of the most unexpected and truly satisfying climaxes in recent movie history. What it is, though, we're not going to say. That's for you to find out. What we will say is that Napoleon Dynamite is an amazing film, an enormously affectionate and hilarious comedy with a unique but sunny world view. And we want more. "Napoleon easily has potential for sequels or TV shows and all kinds of stuff," says Heder. "Fans are always telling us they want more adventures, so it would be easy to franchise." Director Hess has his own ideas. "I think it would make a great cartoon. The guy who did our storyboards did them in a King of the Hill style. They would also translate very well into a TV show because the characters are so defined. You could find a lot of varied scenarios for them that could hold a couple of seasons worth of stuff." At least a couple. For now, though, this single, awesome movie is all we have of Napoleon and his adventures. Add it to your list and enjoy.
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