“‘PC Load Letter’? …what the fuck does that mean?!”
For this ongoing little sub-series, let’s turn back 25 years to the end of the last millennium—the good old days, when people were freaking out over computers updating their clocks, when folks rotted their brain on reality shows and MTV instead of social media, and when Anthony Kiedis dancing in his underwear could still be called popular art.
It was an age when people would still buy movie tickets just to see a single trailer, when the internet was an exciting new frontier of promise that also made funny noises on the phone, and where eyes turned to a new century somehow believing that this time, things could be different. But in seriousness, it also seems fitting that 1999 had actually quite a good run in movies—certainly an interesting one at any rate, be they good or not. From Keanu dodging bullets in new-fangled slo-mo to Winona Ryder being interrupted, there were enough memorable entries upon celluloid that I’d group them together for this ongoing look at the Class of ’99.
And starting things off with something low-key but still pertinent, here’s a look at what Mike Judge had to offer. You might know him as the guy who did Beavis and Butthead (heheh, heheheh, ‘did’), or King of the Hill, but beyond animation he dabbled in feature film, bringing over that same sardonic sense of humor to frame all the nonsense in our everyday lives we take for granted. Between condescending bosses to printers not friggin’ working, some things really haven’t changed that much in a quarter-century, as Office Space showcases!
We open on a trio of office drones working on interminable projects in a nondescript IT company—with Peter (Ron Livingston), Michael Bolton (no not that one, as played by David Herman) and Samir (Ajay Naidu). Their work seems to involve debugging something related to Y2K (ah, remember that? Well this was made before all that wonderful hysteria sat in, so it’s all described offhand!), and being mithered over reports by one of the most memorable parts of the film, Gary Cole as supervizor Bill Lumbergh.
With every moment he’s on, Cole perfectly exudes that faux-friendly, slightly unnerving company-issue simulacrum of a human being attitude we’ve all encountered in any job. And you know what, by all accounts, it hasn’t gotten better since.
And it’s indeed thanks to him and the drudgery of work that Peter ends up freely describing his apathy after a hypnosis session gone wrong makes him more uninhibited, to another pair of memorable characters with Paul Willson and John McClingley as consultants trying to downsize the workforce (who, would you know it, actually find his honesty rather useful). It’s not long after that where Michael and Samir end up joining him in a ploy to get back at the company that, would you know it, doesn’t go as well as you’d think.
Then there’s that moment where they execute a printer gangland style. It makes sense enough in context. And it’s something we’ve all wanted at some point. Because let’s face it, printers are the early stage of a machine takeover by eroding people’s sanity. Because what encapsulates that nonsense more than being told you have no ink only for it to cough up indecipherable garbage and lines because that clearly means there is ink enough to print a basic sheet and arghgblarglghghghg—
Ahem. Anyway, that’s essentially what makes Office Space work—that level of relatability, combined with that level of memorability. And 25 years on, too much rings too true—like the ‘less desired’ employees (here represented by the oddball Milton, as played by Stephen Root) being deliberately screwed over, to even lower level jobs putting on pressure for even trivial things (as we see with love interest Jennifer Aniston, harangued in her waitress job). All the little absurdities in life, all the nonsense from career jockeys that has burdened people since time immemorial—in some ways, incapsulated well enough here. And, to an extent, a little catharsis against that is given.
That kicks off the Class of ’99—with much more to come…
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