Recently watched an old movie –
Office Space ( Justified to say “Old” for 1999 I guess !)
And boy ! Was pleasantly amazed. Had I watched it 10 years back , I would not have enjoyed the movie so much as I did now.
The IT folks can so easily relate to this movie – the daily office nuisances , bugging boss ( if u r unlucky !) , Monday blues , Functional Specs , Review comments , Coffee breaks , Short-term crushes ,Birthday celebrations , Weekend-working , Late hours, Peer gossips , One-to-one meetings , Deadlines, Traumatic Xerox machines , Performance reviews , Newer policies , Paycheck issues and so on and on !
The character that I found to be the most remarkable is that of the boss of INITECH – Bill Lumbergh ( Gary Cole) with his impeccable skill to find the slightest and sleekest loopholes and a very unique style of racking – “
Yeeeaaah , if you can just go ahead and do it , that would be greaaaat !”. You can see this guy walking from pillar to post in the office with a cup full of never-ending coffee and harassing the employees . His proverbial "
So what's happening ?" is the most dreaded line which often initiates a fresh line of work or some sort of trouble for the employees. Watch the movie and you will know what I am talking about. Lumbergh gets 10 on 10 as the guile & irritating boss to make the plot a perfect slapstick.
And so is Peter (Ron Livingston), the Lumbergh-tortured , victimized employee who turns , after a Hypnotherapy session, into the devil-may-care slack-skinned dude ( or employee rather) and gets a promotion nevertheless whereas his hard-working friends Michael Bolton ( David Herman) and Samir ( Ajay Naidu) gets short-listed for the pink slips !
Not to forget a miserably tormented Milton(Stephen Root) - Habituated to moving his desk every now and then , heads his workstation to the Basement Storage house finally upon Lumbergh's prolonged windy pinches ! The overly troubled soul works in the office and gets his paychecks even 5 years after he was laid off just because no one ever told him that he was sacked !
A thoroughly enjoyable comedy – custom-made for a weekend watch and getting ready for the ensuing Monday Blues !