Idiocracy

Steve Sailer is covering the news that Idiocracy—think The Marching Morons set to film—has been tanked by FOX. It has been released in an insultingly small number of theatres to no advertising.

A June article in Esquire describes a few of the troubles that director Mike Judge had with FOX over the movie:

Idiocracy was supposed to be different. He filmed it two years ago, but once photography was finished, the real problems began: So-and-so executive hasn't had a chance to see it, so everything was put on hold. Then Fox started nickel-and-diming him over a few special-effects costs. Finally, once the movie was totally finished last fall, Judge and the execs started to butt heads over the marketing, especially the trailers. (He's still steamed over the ad campaign for Office Space.) "They're just overthinking it, which is what they always do," Judge says. "It's just about an average dumb-ass person who winds up in the future. It's not about 'What if you could travel through time....'

Edward Havens at FilmJerk suggests one possible reason for FOX's ire:

Rumor also has it that the film was the target of a civil suit by several large corporations who were unhappy with the way they were being satirized in the film, and the lawsuit helped the studio lose confidence in the film, even though this all happened after the film was greenlit.