Joyelle Ronan
Like its protagonist of the same name, the film Napoleon Dynamite became an unlikely hero when it premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2004. As a student at Brigham Young University, Jared Hess wrote and directed a short film called Pecula (2002) starring Jon Heder. Hess went on to cast Heder as Napoleon Dynamite in a script he co-wrote with his wife, Jerusha Hess. He directed the film on a budget of $400,000, and while many cult classics take years to gain recognition, by the end of its release year, it made close to $45 million. The indie film resonated with young people throughout the country and helped spawn the “geek chic” movement in the early 2000s.
Napoleon Dynamite is a gawky teen growing up in Preston, Idaho. Despite his claim to have “nunchuck skills, bow hunting skills, computer hacking skills,” his peers perceive him as a loser. He lives with his brother Kip (Aaron Ruell), who spends all his time talking to women on internet chat rooms. When their grandmother has a dune buggy incident, she sends their Uncle Rico to babysit them, despite Uncle Rico’s own immaturity as he can’t seem to get over his past as a high school football player. Napoleon goes through the school year with his best friends, Pedro (Efren Ramirez) and Deb (Tina Majorino), never compromising who he is. The film culminates with Napoleon showing off his sweet dance moves to help Pedro win the election for class president.
I’m unsure if it was growing up religious or in a small town that made Napoleon Dynamite so beloved in my immediate community. I remember my brother and I getting keychains in our Christmas stockings where each button was a different catchphrase like “Whatever I feel like, gosh!“ or “Freakin’ idiot.“ My brother still has his small tin Napoleon Dynamite lunch box but has long since outgrown his “Vote For Pedro“ T-shirt. During a 4-H talent show in 2005 or 2006, a boy dressed as Dynamite performed the character’s dance scene. Looking back, it almost seemed straight out of the movie. An outdated high school auditorium in a town that no one would choose to vacation in. Therein lies its charm, finding humor in the awkward and average. Memorable one-liners and quirky characters could have been enough to make Napoleon Dynamite a good comedy, but its visual creativity and style make it a great film.
So much of Napoleon Dynamite’s humor stems from the inherent awkwardness of existing. Its middle-of-nowhere, Idaho setting adds a layer of relatability for anyone who has ever lived far from a major metropolis. While the film didn’t invent this particular brand of obscure humor, it championed it in the early 2000s — a period that would have shows like The Office and The Middle. Still, Napoleon Dynamite remains a bit of an anomaly, to the point where it has affected algorithms predicting how much someone will like a film based on other films. It’s been deemed “The Napoleon Dynamite Problem.“ So, how can a PG-rated, 90-minute (longer if you watch the end-credit scene) movie be so polarizing?
Critic Roger Ebert found little humor in the film and gave it one and a half stars in his 2004 review. He ends his review by stating, “I’m told the movie was greeted at Sundance with lots of laughter, but then Sundance audiences are concerned with being cool, and to sit through this film in depressed silence would not be cool, however urgently it might be appropriate.”
In 2004, the concept of a “hipster“ was just beginning to form. It would later describe anyone who does things ironically and rejects anything considered mainstream or popular. It played a role in transforming the word “nerd“ from an insult to a compliment. But, if that were the demographic that Ebert had in mind, depressed silence would be considered cool, and the very act of enjoyment would be regarded as uncool. Maybe it’s not irony that struck a chord with this particular sundance crowd, but rather the film’s sincerity.
A major criticism of the film seems to be that Napoleon is the butt of the joke. In her 2004 Entertainment weekly review, Lisa Schwarzbaum said, “Filmmaker Jared Hess (who co-wrote the script with his wife, Jerusha Hess) installs Napoleon front and center as a punchline in and of himself — and as that dispiriting product of narrative defeat, a symbol.“ But Hess is laughing with Napoleon, not at him. In fact, it was loosely based on his own life growing up in Preston, Idaho. Pieces of dialogue and specific scenes like working on an egg farm or a cow being shot in front of a school bus of kids are straight from Hess’s life experience. Instead of shying away from the awkward or embarrassing moments of his youth, he embraces the humor in them. One of the best lessons Napoleon Dynamite teaches is to dance like nobody’s watching, and by not caring what others think, you gain the ability to laugh at yourself.
The comedy is often situational, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t also clever and well-written. Napoleon Dynamite is incredibly quotable. Lines like “Tina, you fat lard, come and get some dinner,“ which Napoleon says to his family’s llama, or “Can you bring me my chapstick? But my lips hurt real bad“ are eccentric enough to make a mark on pop culture. But, there are smaller moments that my parent and I still quote to this day — when Kip does well in bowling and quietly says “yes“ while pulling down his first in front of his face or when Uncle Rico is attempting to sell Tupperware to a couple, and he pulls out a free gift or a wooden ship and the wife whispers, “I want that.“
A great script needs a great cast. Luckily, Hess didn’t have to search for his leading man, as his college classmate Heder had already starred in the short film that inspired Napoleon Dynamite. At one point, a casting director suggested Jake Gyllenhaal for the role. Hess immediately said no, telling Deseret News in a 2019 interview that Heder was born to play this part. “It didn’t feel like an actor or a parody,“ Hess said. “There was such an authenticity to how Jon was bringing the character to life. Casting a known actor that already had a history and a relationship with audiences, you wouldn’t buy it as much. But Jon being a first-time actor, it’s like you instantly believe that ‘Wow, this Napoleon guy is for real.’“
Like Hess, Heder also pulled material from his own life growing up Mormon. He told the Desert Times, “Both Jared and I grew up in these big families with lots of brothers. It was like Jared had stepped into my past and seen how we talked. You didn’t use swear words, so you created alternatives. Like, decroded [from Napoleon] is completely nonsensical, but it sounds so legit.“ While Heder went on to have a few other hits, most notably The Benchwarmers (2006) and Blades of Glory (2007), Napoleon is the kind of role that stays with an actor. 20 years later, Heder still plays the character in Tater Tot commercials and creates cameo videos to raise money for Stand Up to Cancer.
Every actor understood the film’s tone, regardless of how much screen time they had. Rex of Rex Kwon Do (Diedrich Bader) is in the movie for a scene and a half, yet makes such an impact with every line delivery, “Break the wrist, walk away. Break the wrist, walk away,“ he instructs Kip. Jon Gries is a character actor who has been in more minor roles in larger projects, including Lost and Seinfeld and is by far best known as Uncle Rico. His chemistry with Kip perfectly captures what it’s like to befriend a relative that you probably wouldn’t hang out with if you weren’t related. There’s an averageness to each character that makes them feel so real, but their quirks keep them from ever becoming boring.
From Napoleon’s horse t-shirt to Deb’s high side-ponytail, the film’s style and aesthetic help to establish these notorious, unstylish characters. Hess’s directorial style has been likened to Wes Anderson for his use of color and a vibe that doesn’t quite fit one single decade. While Hess’s follow-up film, Nacho Libre (2006), has an even stronger color palette of vibrant blues and reds, Napoleon Dynamite still has a distinct palette. Set against a backdrop of rural Idaho, the bland shades of brown, orange, yellow, and dusty blue work so well to stylize the story. The colors give a very 1970s look paired with music from the 80s and fashion from the 90s despite the film taking place in 2004. It feels timeless, or maybe it’s just that when you live in the middle of nowhere, it takes a while for anything cool and trendy to reach you.
But then again, Napoleon Dynamite was never about being cool. The core message of embracing your inner dork can get lost in all the discourse, but that’s ultimately what resonated with young people at the time. 20 years later, I have yet to find a film that’s as unique, funny, and genuine as Napoleon Dynamite. The film predates YouTube by a year but has the same essence of the early days when a stupid, albeit funny video would go viral and launch a complete unknown into fame. Fresh out of college and equipped with a sense of humor born out of the Mormon religion, Hess and friends created something singular. This is perhaps the reason why the animated television series released in 2012 failed after such six episodes; the original just can’t be recreated. Whether or not a person finds it hilarious or “pretty much the worst video ever made,“ (Napoleon says to Uncle Rico after seeing his football reel.) (“Napoleon, like anyone can even know that,” Kip responds), Napoleon will forever go down as one of the greatest nerds in pop culture history.
