Office Space

Red = Spoilers 

Office Space is a 1999 comedy by Mike Judge. It’s about a programmer who can’t stand his job and gives up being a part of the uptight office world. But his plan backfires when he convinces his two friends to help him create a virus to rob the company they work for of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Office Space has the same smart, witty charm that all of Mike Judge’s work does. Shows including Beavis and Butt-Head, Daria, and King of the Hill, and movies like “Idiocracy”.  

What’s it about? Peter Gibbons, an unhappy programmer, is driving to work as the traffic jam he’s in keeps backing up, further and further. He finally gets to work at the software company that he works for, Initech, and goes to open the door, when it shocks him, like it does every day. He gets to his desk and gets confronted by numerous people about missing the top sheet on his TPS reports and if he got the memo about it. He goes to his friends Michael and Samir and asks if they want to get out of the office and go get some coffee, where he sees Joanna, the waitress he has a crush on. Michael asks Peter if he wants to play poker later that night. Peter says he’s going to an occupational hypnotherapist to try to work things out with his current girlfriend, Anne. While he’s there, the therapist has a heart attack in the middle of hypnotizing Peter, leaving him in the middle of a relaxed state. Peter skips work the next day, ignoring all the messages that his boss leaves on his answering machine, as well as the message from Anne, telling him she’s breaking up with him and that she’s been cheating on him. A pair of business consultants are brought into Initech to help them downsize the company while Peter goes to the fictional restaurant Chotche’s to talk to Joanna and ask her if she wants to have lunch with him. After lunch with Joanna, Peter goes back to Initech to meet with the consultants where they are impressed by his honest and frank displays of apathy. The consultants also decide to fire Michael and Samir after interviewing them. When Peter tells them, he convinces them to help him install a virus on the company’s computer that would rob it of hundreds of thousands of dollars. When Peter goes to check the account balance the next day, he discovers that the virus has stolen over $300k all at the same time. Not knowing what to do, the three go back to Peter’s house to try to figure out a plan when a young man comes to the door selling magazine subscriptions. He is pretending to be a former crackhead to get sympathy to sell more mgazines. He tells them that he used to be a former programmer and that he makes way more money selling magazines than he ever did programming. When Peter says that they know a lot of the same people, the guy blackmails Peter into buying 40 subscriptions to Vibe. That night, Peter writes a confession and takes an envelope full of travelers checks for the amount they stole to Initech and slides in under his boss’s door. The next day, he goes into Initech expecting to be arrested to find the building on fire.  

What’s good? Everything. Office Space is one of those comedies that you can watch 100 times and it’s still funny. I don’t know how many times I’ve seen it, but it’s a lot. And it’s still funny, every time.  

What’s bad? Not much that I can think of. It’s easier to just admit I don’t see anything wrong with this movie than to sit here thinking about something to find wrong with it. 

The acting? They’re all great actors. Stephen Root as Milton is one of the most recognizable characters in film now.  

The effects? There’s not really any effects. The most I can think of is when they made the parts from the printer fly up when Michael was punching at it. But that’s just a camera angle trick. That’s not really an effect.  

Why can’t Michael rap? Michael’s nervous around black people and turns the radio down and locks the doors when the black guy comes walking past his car when he’s sitting in traffic, listening to rap on the radio. Typical white guy stuff… 

If he just grounded himself. If Peter would just ground himself somehow, he wouldn’t get shocked by the door handle every time.  

I have the memo. How many memos do people get in a day at Initech? Do they get memos about getting memos? That’s so meta. It’s meta-memo… 

He’s the one who sucks. It’s true. Michael Bolton does suck. Michael Bolton should have to change his name. Everything bad should happen to Michael Bolton… 

Sounds like somebody’s got a case of “the Mondays”. I don’t know if it’s so much just the saying itself as much as it is the way that they say it. Do they have to make the air quotes and the stupid face every time they say it? That’s what’s really pissing me off about it. 

The jump to conclusions mat. What are they jumping to conclusions for? There’s no questions for anything. It’s like a game of hopscotch with words written on it. It doesn’t make any sense.  

I get that feeling too. Everybody says “I get that feeling too” when Peter says “I get the feeling that Anne’s cheating on me”. Shouldn’t that make you at least a little bit more suspicious? At least ask a few questions. It turned out she was cheating on him anyway. So it’s not like his feelings were unfounded. 

Two chicks at the same time. Lawrence has his priorities in order. He answered right away when Peter asked him what he’d do if he had a million dollars. It didn’t even take him two seconds. He automatically knew the answer. Like he’d thought about it before. Two chicks at the same time. Some guys just know what they want… 

Why doesn’t he just say no? When Lumbergh asks Peter to work on the weekend, why doesn’t Peter just say he can’t? Why does he say yes? It’s really Peter’s fault for agreeing to come to work every weekend.  

Why not just let them call him Michael? If Michael would’ve just kept lying to those guys until the interview was over and let them think he liked Michael Bolton, they wouldn’t have fired him. Fake it till you make it… 

Milton’s stapler. It seems like Lumbergh took Milton’s stapler just out of spite. It’s kind of like they were pushing him as far as they could on purpose, just to see how far they could push him. 

So, more flair then? Seriously, if you want her to wear more flair, make the minimum number more. She asked him if he wanted her to wear more and he refused to answer her. It’s kind of his fault… 

Why label it “virus”? Why would you label the virus “virus”? They would clearly be looking for something with a word even closely resembling the word “virus”. You would want to label the file something obscure that had nothing to do with viruses. Like “docfolder” or something.  

Fight the printer. One of the best fight scenes in movie history. They kicked that printer’s ass… 

Michael punching the printer. He was punching a solid printer with his bare fist. Wouldn’t that just cut up his knuckles and make his hands bleed? That would be incredibly painful. Although, when you’re that pumped up on adrenaline, maybe you feel the pain so much… 

Why’d they turn the lights out on Milton. Why did they turn the lights out on Milton when he was down in the basement? That’s what set him over the edge. They pushed him and pushed him, and then they turned the lights out on him, and that was it. Now he’s gonna burn the place down… 

What’s he packing for? What was Peter packing for? He’s going to prison? Why was he packing like he’s going on vacation somewhere? You don’t need new clothes in prison. They got your clothes. Prison clothes… 

Poor Milton. Milton can’t catch a break. He gets all this money, and he heads on down to Mexico and he can’t get the right drink or good service. The universe just doesn’t like some people… 

So, yeah. Go and see Office Space. It’s a true classic of comedy that everybody should see, sooner or later. And as always, keep on watching, with a smile on your face…