Mixed nuts

Despite the testicle gags, Mike Judge’s Extract is a low-key, likeable ensemble comedy

BOSSMAN’S BLUES: Affleck and Bateman

Over the past couple of decades Mike Judge has become a godfather of sorts in the worlds of animation for grown-ups and sardonic, satirical live-action comedy. While The Simpsons deserves a great deal of credit too, it’s hard to imagine stuff like Metalocalypse and Aqua Teen Hunger Force without the influence of Beavis and Butthead and King of the Hill. And before The Office, there was 1999’s Office Space, a box-office flop that became a huge hit on DVD and cable among those who identified with its sardonic take on the cubicle-dwelling life.

Judge’s last live-action feature, Idiocracy, which was set in a future where evolution had worked to make mankind incredibly dumb (and which was, by design, one of the grossest-looking movies ever), was a departure from his usual laid-back and naturalistic style. He returns to the workplace, though, in his newest, Extract, a low-key comedy told from the boss’s point of view.

Jason Bateman plays Joel, the owner of a flavour extract factory. He’s plagued by a sexless marriage (to Kristen Wiig) and bickering employees, taking solace at a hotel sports bar where his buddy (Ben Affleck) serves up drinks and the occasional hit of ketamine. When one of his employees (Clifton Collins Jr.) loses a vital bit of his manhood in an industrial accident, he attracts the attention of a saucy grifter (Mila Kunis) looking to capitalize on it with the help of an oily lawyer (Gene Simmons, of all people). Bateman is in full Michael Bluth mode here, playing the only semi-responsible guy trying to steer a ship of fools and he leads an all-around strong cast that also includes J.K. Simmons and an amusingly obnoxious David Koechner.

Despite the presence of male gigolos, missing testicles and a bearded, long-haired Ben Affleck, Extract is not really a broad comedy. It’s a gentler and low-key thing, the kind of movie that seems to specifically avoid portraying any of the characters as one-dimensional bad guys (something that Forgetting Sarah Marshall also did well). I didn’t really laugh out loud too much during the movie, though I consistently chuckled and may have even guffawed a handful of times. It’s a very… nice movie, though it left me wanting a little more.

EXTRACT OPENS THIS FRIDAY, SEPT. 4