Year: 2009
Running Time: 91 minutes
Rated: R
SRP: $ 39.99
Studio(s): Miramax Studios
Release Date: December 22, 2009

Film/Feature: C+
Mike Judge is one of those few creators who understands what makes people laugh in both animation, and live action. A good comedic mind would tell you that it doesn’t matter what the format is, and they’re right, but it’s rare to be able to toe that line and do it as successfully as Judge. He’s given us Beavis and Butthead, King of the Hill, and to many of you out there, he’s simply known as the man behind Office Space. It the latter’s more of your taste, then perhaps you might want to see how Judge’s cubicle dynamics go from the corporate buzzkill to the assembly line at Reynold’s Almond Extract.

Joel (Jason Bateman) is sexually frustrated CEO of a small extract company piddling about his routine life until he runs into the worst month of his life. A freak accident threatens to destroy the company and a two-bit scam artist (Mila Kunis) is pulling the strings. If only he could make it home before 8pm. After the clock strikes eight, his wife (Kristin Wiig) puts on the sweat pants and the chance of him getting lucky goes out the door. His best friend Dean (Ben Affleck), a bartender and Xanax pusher, comes up with a wild and elaborate plan to rid him of all of his troubles; except that Dean and plan should never be used in the same sentence.

Extract is a nice, bite-sized distraction that’s character-driven and doesn’t try so hard to be so outrageous that it becomes just another mind-numbing forgettable comedy. Unfortunately there’s not enough there to guarantee a spot amongst a must-see pile of films out there. It has its share of laughs that jab at workplace logic that never gets old–this time with a blue collar spin–but just because there’s nothing wrong with it, doesn’t make Extract a film you have to rush out and see. Think of a vineyard with a great wine that you love, and then you try one of the other wines in their lineup. It’s got a different direction to it, it’s not as robust, and it has similar notes, but it falls well-short of being a memorable wine. Well, Extract has plenty of positive things going for it, but it just falls short of being a memorable comedy.

What it does have going for it is that you know these people, you know this place and you know the characters that can aggravate you to no end. It’s not specific to one city or region of the country. It’s everywhere and Judge’s Extract has a way of taking what you know and feeding off of that familiarity in an enjoyable enough film. Just temper your expectations.

Video:C+
Miramax put Extract on blu-ray with a 1080p AVC-encoded transfer in its original 1.85:1 aspect ratio. Colors aren’t as terrific as you’d hope and most notably, the skin tones push towards a pink-orange area that needs some color correction. Blacks and contrast could have been stronger, deeper and more pronounced. Details and clarity sort of phase in and out at times, and the most discernible eyes will catch the spots where this happens. I’d hope for a better looking film and understand this is a small independent film we’re looking at, but the bottom line is that I’m not walking away too impressed by the video.

Audio:C+
Much like the film, there’s nothing really fancy about Extract’s 5.1 English DTS-HD audio track. It’s a mainly a dialogue-driven film, with music pushed to the front and surrounding channels. Suburban neighborhood and some factory noise also gets sent to the rear channels but the volume is turned down so low that you’d have to pump up the volume to really hear it from where you’ll likely be seated, so I was disappointed with the effort here although I expected Extract to be a low-key title to begin with. Other audio selections include: a French 5.1 Dolby Digital track and subtitles are available in English SDH, French, and Spanish.

Extras:D+
There’s not much to the extras of Extract, and no blu-ray exclusives. In fact, you’ll probably learn more about the film in this Mike Judge Q/A session.

Mike Judge’s Secret Recipe HD (11:00) A brief making-of EPK extra the interviews Judge and some cast members about the story of Extract.

Extended Scenes HD (4:00) are five scenes that do run long and were wisely edited.

Deleted Scene HD (0:37) One deleted scene was taken out involving a conversation between Dead and Joel on the “day after.”

Trailers HD previews for When in Rome, Surrogates, and the Boys are Back

Overall Shock Value:C+
I didn’t think much of Office Space after my first viewing but the more I saw it the more I enjoyed it. I never took my affection to the extreme that I’ve heard others share, but Extract is something different; it’s smaller and more intimate, which I found to be one of Extract’s more endearing qualities. Will I think rabid Office Space fans will see this on par with this fabled film? Probably not, but there are some good fresh moments in this film that many viewers should connect with. Extract is devoid of any substantial extras and this is not a blu-ray of high technical achievement. I’d still recommend Extract as a rental.