Unfairly Overlooked Comedy On Tubi Is A Modern Napoleon Dynamite

By Robert Scucci
| Published 7 seconds ago

If you grew up when Napoleon Dynamite (2004) was first making the rounds, you either loved or hated the film. Personally, I was always a big fan because it did the unthinkable by having so many aggressively quirky characters not wear out their welcome. That awkward humor that would later become the norm through series like The Office and Parks and Recreation is very much indebted to Napoleon Dynamite for proving that, so long as everybody is earnest, they can remain wacky and off-kilter whenever they’re on screen.

2019’s The Planters operates in this lane and very much feels like a spiritual successor to Napoleon Dynamite, with a healthy amount of Wes Anderson influence thrown in for good measure. My first thought, before I even looked up what people were saying about the film, was that its lead, writer-director Alexandra Kotcheff, is like a cross between Napoleon Dynamite and Aubrey Plaza. When I finally made my way over to IMDb to check out some reviews, I learned that I was not alone in this assessment.

It’s Very Much The Journey, Not The Destination

The Planters is one of those films that finds joy in meandering through its scenery. Its story centers on Martha Plant (Alexandra Kotcheff), a young woman who lives alone in her grandparents’ house after their passing. By day, she’s a telemarketer for an air-conditioning company, but she learns she’s about to be terminated after making only five sales, even though she’s been working for them for years. She flatly reads her scripts, gets hung up on, and repeats the process with a blank face and total lack of enthusiasm.

Outside of her regular job, Martha is a self-proclaimed planter, which, to the best of my understanding, involves stealing trinkets from a local thrift store, putting them in old cookie tins, burying them in the desert, and returning a day later to collect money from the now-empty tins. It’s a strangely elaborate black-market arrangement, but she’s only doing it for a few extra dollars here and there.

One day, while doing planter stuff, Martha has a run-in with a vagrant woman named Sadie Mayflower (writer-director Hanna Leder), who’s first seen with a football helmet chained to her face. Martha takes her in, feeds her, gives her a place to sleep, and continues to go about her days. As luck would have it, Sadie is actually a great salesperson and thinks she can save Martha from losing her telemarketing job by helping her hit a new quota she has only a month to fulfill.

The problem, though, is that Sadie is revealed to suffer from a split personality disorder, and there’s no reasonable way to predict who she’ll become next. One day, Sadie is helping Martha close deals, and before you know it, she’s banging a rattle, acting like an infant, and begging for a bubble bath. The relationship dynamic is further explored when Richard Cox (Phil Parolisi), a man with car troubles, shows up to stay and quickly falls in love with Martha, who remains completely oblivious to his obvious infatuation.

It Gets Even Weirder

If the relationship dynamic in The Planters isn’t strange enough, it’s worth mentioning that one of the cookie tins in Martha’s cabinet is home to a collection of stop-motion Bible figurines that depict various passages from the Old Testament whenever Sadie opens it. She seems enlightened whenever she encounters the tin, prompting her to seek religious guidance at a nearby church. Martha eventually discovers it herself, and I’m still trying to figure out where all of this actually fits into the movie, aside from offering a “that’s so random” element to an already quirky premise.

I’m sure there’s some allegory to consider here, but presently, it’s lost on me. It could be about how we’re all empty until we experience some sort of spiritual awakening, or it could simply be an effort to pad the runtime. I’ll leave that interpretation up to you, but I can’t say I’m upset that these sequences are in the film. If anything, they serve as a thematic bookmark between acts, as something kooky typically happens after these moments.

The Planters, despite some of its more questionable creative decisions, is one of those movies that’s fun to throw on and vibe with. There’s really not much going on in terms of major events. The entertainment value comes from a quirky yet wholesome group of strangers who make a much bigger deal out of the situations they find themselves in. It’s Napoleon Dynamite for tired millennials, and it’s a rewarding watch if you go into it with those expectations.

As of this writing, The Planters is streaming for free on Tubi.