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Napoleon Dynamite Napoleon Dynamite is the funniest movie of the year. This low budget gem outshines all of the over-hyped Hollywood summer blockbusters combined. After creating a big buzz at The Sundance Film Festival, it was only a matter of time before this film received the proper distribution it deserves.
Napoleon Dynamite, played by Jon Heder, is an awkward, uncoordinated 17 year-old high school senior at Preston High School in Preston, Idaho. He is the ultimate geek, so absorbed in his own warped reality, that he lives in a fantasy world all his own. He is like a modern-day geek super hero, sans cape, rocking some mean moonboots and a sweet red 'fro. His older brother Kip, played by Aaron Ruell, is quite the loser himself. Kip doesn't work and is in internet chatrooms all day "talking to babes". He carries on a long-distance relationship, via internet chatting, with his "soulmate" LaFawnduh. Grandma is another character of the opposite extreme. She has a passion for riding all-terrain vehicles with her boyfriend. She actually has a life, a quite active one for an old lady too. They all live together in a ranch house in rural Idaho as one big dysfunctional family along with Grandma's pet llama, Tina.
While out jumping ATV's, Grandma injures herself and ends up in the hospital. She calls on Uncle Rico, played by Jon Gries, to come and stay at the house and care for Kip and Napoleon. Uncle Rico is a freeloading, shady character that is stuck in 1982. He constantly talks about his glory days of high school football and how he "could've gone pro". He was living in his van before moving in with Kip and Napoleon and would videotape himself throwing touchdown passes. Uncle Rico enlists Kip's help in his latest money-making swindle, selling Tupperware door-to-door. When this fails to be productive and Kip eventually goes his own way, and Uncle Rico begins to sell herbal breast-enlargement pills to the neighborhood housewives.
Napoleon befriends Pedro (Efren Ramirez), a Mexican kid who is also an outcast at Preston High. Pedro is about as dim a character as Napoleon, so the two get along famously. Besides, Pedro has a "sweet bike". What more could Napoleon ask for in a buddy? The two make a perfect, yet odd, dynamic duo that are always looking to "pick-up chicks" and start their hopeless search for dates for the school dance.
Deb (Tina Majorino), is another off-beat character that becomes friends with Napoleon and Pedro. Deb earns money for college by selling handmade bracelets door to door and also runs her own glamour shots studio out of her bedroom. When Deb first tried to sell Napoleon a bracelet on his doorstep, he replies, "I already made, like, infinity of those in scout camp", in typical Napoleon fashion. Deb ran away in horror, but eventually becomes a love interest of his.
You follow Napoleon's trials and tribulations growing up a super-geek in small town America. The constant struggle of being a nerdy outcast and being put down and beat up by the cool kids at school. Napoleon eventually becomes triumphant in his struggles and even finds love, shared over a game of tetherball on the playground. He even conquers the cool kids at school with his super-cool dance moves that win Pedro the school election. What more could you ask for?
Napoleon Dynamite was written by Jared Hess and his wife Jerusha. It was directed by Jared, 24, a Brigham Young University student, and is surprisingly well done considering its budget of $200,000. Considering most Hollywood flops cost more than 30 times that amount, I'd consider that to be quite an accomplishment.
While to some the movie may seem short on plot, as there is no real struggle present, it's entertaining from start to finish. The characters are well-developed and highly original. Napoleon Dynamite, in his own words, would definitely have to say that this movie is "SWEET!"
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