Napoleon Dynamite - Reception

Reception

The film received generally positive reviews; Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a 71% "fresh" approval rating based on 163 reviews with an average score of 6.3 out of 10. Rolling Stone magazine complimented the film, saying "Hess and his terrific cast — Heder is geek perfection — make their own kind of deadpan hilarity. You'll laugh till it hurts. Sweet." The Christian Science Monitor called the film "a refreshing new take on the overused teen-comedy genre" and said that the film "may not make you laugh out loud - it's too sly and subtle for that - but it will have you smiling every minute, and often grinning widely at its weirded-out charm." Michael Atkinson of The Village Voice condemned the film as "a movie, that despite all indications to the contrary, is one that absolutely no one likes." In a mixed review, The New York Times praised Heder's performance and the "film's most interesting quality, which is its stubborn, confident, altogether weird individuality," while criticizing the film's resolution that comes "too easily." Prominent film critic Roger Ebert gave the film one-and-a-half stars, noting that he felt that "the movie makes no attempt to make likable" and that it contained "a kind of studied stupidity that sometimes passes as humor". At the time, Entertainment Weekly gave the film a C-.

Entertainment Weekly later ranked Napoleon #88 on its 2010 list of The 100 Greatest Characters of the Last 20 Years, saying "A high school misfit found a sweet spot, tapping into our inner dork." The film was on several year-end lists. Rolling Stone's placed it at number 22 of the 25 Top DVDs of 2004.

The term "The Napoleon Dynamite Problem" has been used to describe the phenomenon where "quirky" films such as Napoleon Dynamite, Lost in Translation, and I Heart Huckabees prove difficult for researchers to create algorithms that are able to predict whether or not a particular viewer will like the film based on their ratings of previously viewed films.

Despite some mixed reviews and a very limited initial release, Napoleon Dynamite was a commercial success. It was filmed on an estimated budget of a mere $400,000, and less than a year after its release, it had grossed $44,940,956. It also spawned a slew of merchandise, from refrigerator magnets to T-shirts to Halloween costumes. Probably the biggest boost was obtained from the "Vote for Pedro" t-shirts that coincided with the popularity of pitcher Pedro Martinez in 2004.