Do not let the lure of the creator of Office Space, Jason Bateman or Kristen Wiig trick you into watching Extract. I should have run the minute that Ben Affleck appeared in Extract. Extract has a promising start when Mila Kunis snookers two salesmen at a guitar shop to the frustration of her fellow customers. It is the funniest scene in the movie, and it is the first one. Extract has an implausible story that would only happen in a movie, which is not necessarily a bad thing when it is effective, which Extract is not. Bateman plays the hapless yet benevolent/incompetent owner and founder of a flavor extract company. He hates his life and makes extraordinarily bad decisions. His only friend is Affleck, a self-interested bartender who gives spectacularly bad advice. His wife is sexually uninterested in him, but he does not talk to her about it. His employees are egotistical, ineffectual, self-sabotaging, prejudiced nightmares, but he never fires them. His neighbor is cluelessly annoying and omnipresent. I suppose Extract can be considered amusing in an awkward way. Women’s worth is proportional to their sexual availability and desirability. Extract was so bad that it has made me question whether Bateman has ever made a funny movie, which he has, but the viewing of this movie retroactively obliterated my enjoyment of his prior performances. My reaction is unfair. The blame should rest on the writers and director of Extract who failed to make a funny movie.
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There was a missed opportunity for mistaken identity shenanigans. The bartender encourages the owner to hire a gigolo to seduce the owner’s wife so the owner won’t feel guilty if he cheats on her with the hot scam artist. I thought that the stupid gigolo was going to make a mistake and seduce the annoying neighbor’s wife then when the owner confronted his wife, it would improve their relationship. Then the annoying neighbor would get a divorce and move out. There would be a credible resolution of two conflicts, and the stability at home would improve his outlook at work and get him away from the scam artist who was sabotaging his business. I think my version of Extract makes more sense.