"Napoleon Dynamite" is a gloriously quirky, hysterically funny ode to rural dullness that is probably the fairest, most accurate
film representation that Preston, Idaho, will ever get. First-time director Jared Hess, who co-wrote with his wife Jerusha, lovingly mocks the denizens of his hometown, and of many other people's hometowns, through the muted, unenthusiastic characters who inhabit the film. This is a place where culture, fashion and mustaches stopped developing in the 1970s, with the exception of some girls' hairstyles, which managed to reach the mid-'80s. It's a town that viewers will identify as thoroughly dorky, while the residents themselves are oblivious to their gaucheness. Fans of the Coen brothers ("Raising Arizona," "O Brother, Where Art Thou?") will recognize the sort of lovable oddballs here, chief among them being the title character (played by Jon Heder), a high school senior who draws fantasy creatures, fancies himself a nun-chuck expert, and generally behaves with unselfconscious individuality. Napoleon lives with his 30-year-old brother Kip (Aaron Ruell), a pasty, ambitionless fellow who maintains a long-distance Internet relationship with a woman in Detroit. When their grandmother is injured in an ATV accident, their uncle Rico (Jon Gries) comes to stay, bringing his attachment to his high school football glory days (i.e., 1982) and a number of stupid get-rich-quick schemes with him.
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