Story Line: Unemployed friends Kev (Mendelsohn) and Mick (Sims) work hard at being bored, drunken louts who pass the time watching TV crime shows and bemoaning their fates. Attempting to change their luck, the hapless punks plot a bank robbery, unaware that a gang of professionals has targeted the same institution.
Bottom Line: A veritable paean to sloth and stupidity, Idiot Box features two of the most witless protagonists in screen history and accomplishes the not inconsiderable feat of intriguing a viewer in the ongoing train wreck that is their lives. Writer/director Caesar has fashioned a raw, gritty tragicomedy reminiscent of Trainspotting and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. It limns so authentic a picture of lower-class Australian layabouts as to be documentarian in tenor. Caesar's dialogue is particularly tart and delivered with perfect comic timing by engaging, offbeat young actors. By the way, it's a tribute to Caesar's ability that viewers are deeply affected by the story's unpredictable outcome. --Ed Hulse