Sausage Party - directed by Greg Tiernan & Conrad Vernon
The latest movie from Seth Rogen and his pals and frequent collaborators is their first foray into animation.
As you would expect from Rogen, Jonah Hill, Evan Goldberg, Craig Robinson and the crew this is no PG Pixar affair.... far from it.
Like "Deadpool" before it parents now have another movie over which they will be breaking bad news to their kids who desparatley want to see it because it just looks so cute and funny.
"Sausage Party" is certainly one of those things.
Imagine if food could think.
What would it make of the world as it sits on supermarkets shelves waiting to be purchased and taken away?
That is the central idea behind "Sausage Party".
The food - everything from condiments to snacks to fruits and vegetables to of course the sausages of the title have reached a consensus.
They all believe that the main doors of the supermarket lead to the Great Beyond - Heaven itself inhabited by Gods (that would be people) who will grant them eternal life and happiness.
All that they need is to be selected.
While they wait Frank the Sausage and Brenda the hotdog bun have fallen in love and cannot wait to be united, outside of their packaging in the Great Beyond.
But word comes in the form of a returned jar of Honey Mustard (Danny McBride) that the Great Beyond is a great lie.
It is a horror show filled with violence and death and hunger.
It doesn't take long for the real message to reveal itself here.
"Sausage Party" - and I can hardly believe that I am typing this - is a metaphor for religious belief.
There is even a bagel and a lavash (a Turkish flatbread) that stand in for Jewish and Palestinian enemies.
The bagel named Sammy Davis Jr is voiced by Edward Norton who delivers an uncanny Woody Allen impression while David Krumholtz ("Serenity") voices the lavash - Kareem Abdul Lavash.
The back and forth between the two is pretty blatant in its intention but it is wonderfully funny.
Then there is the frequent flirting amidst ever growing sexual frustration between Frank and Brenda who cannot wait to get together in the manner that a sausage and bun do when a hotdog is made.
They satisfy themselves somewhat with a 'just the tip' moment - their fingers brushing together.
You may be getting the idea that this movie isn't subtle and it would be an understatement to say that it isn't.
The language is raw from the get-go with frequent f-bombs and even a c word chucked in for good measure.
It is exactly what you would expect from the guys who gave us "This Is the End", "Pineapple Express" and "Superbad".
"Sausage Party" isn't as funny as at least two of those but in many ways it is smarter.
There is a brilliant "Saving Private Ryan" parody as a bunch of food falls from a shopping trolley.
Done in desaturated colours it shows a shellshocked Oreo cookie looking for its missing rear biscuit, a can of spaghetti in distress as its contents spill out of a gash in the can like intestines and the trolley rolling in like a German tank crushing unlucky foodstuffs under wheel.
It is a fabulously bang on piss take and very, very good.
Likewise the characterisation is spot on.
Frequently I was impressed that a piece of food had had characteristics applied to it that seemed obvious in hindsight.
The liquor products are all party mad fools, ethnic foodstuffs adopt country of origin accents and often attire and a feminine hygiene product voiced by Nick Kroll is a foul mouthed pervert obsessed with fulfilling its um... design purpose.
There is an ongoing gag that uses a food based figure of speech like 'How do you like them apples?' to which the matching foodstuff will pipe up with an answer.
The movie builds nicely with frequent laughs and some outrageously grotesque scenes and characters such as Salma Hayek as a Lesbian Taco lusting about Brenda, a discarded and very used condom distressed at what had been done to him and a Native America bottle of booze named Firewater who knows more than he is letting on about the real world.
It all starts to unfold in the final act however and there I got the feeling that the writers had no idea how to wrap things up so they just went completely over the top.
It may seem a strange criticism for a dirty movie about talking food but up until the climax the film had been very successful at creating its own form of realism inside the world it had built.
The ending just runs roughshod over all of this good work and frequently left me amazed with its breaking of the fourth wall and ultimately unsatisfying conclusion.
There are also some underused and misused characters and voice actors.
Salma Hayek's randy Taco barely raises a laugh and doesn't further the plot one jot.
Jonah Hill's sausage Carl is similarly poorly served. This character seems to exist to give Hill a part more than to advance the story or provide humour.
When the film turns really dirty it appears to be attempting to out gross-out "Team America: World Police" with its orgiastic sex scene but it isn't a patch on Trey Parker and Matt Stone's classic scene of perverted doll rumpy-pumpy.
Also any time human characters feature heavily the film takes a comedy hit. These characters are best used as straight men for the food and they don't work when used front and centre.
But still- all criticisms aside - this is a comedy and as such it delivers plenty of laughs.
"Sausage Party" has already made $103,000,000 on a $19,000,000 budget and it is easy to see why.
It is different - very different.
Generally the animated movies that make money these days are either the forgetful fish and talking toys of Pixar or the goofy Minions and chatty pets of Illumination Studios.
On a fraction of the budget Sony's "Sausage Party" is nowhere near as technically accomplished as the work of either but they have offered up the perfect antidote for an older audience looking for something edgier and funnier.
"Sausage Party" is certainly both of those things.
RATING: 79 / 100
CONCLUSION: An outrageously filthy and very funny foray into animation for Rogen and his crew. Often razor smart with its satire there are more than enough laughs to make up for a disappointing finale an some wasted characters (no pun intended).
Starring: Seth Rogen, Kristen Wiig, Jonah Hill, Bill Hader, Salma Hayek, Craig Robinson, Paul Rudd, Nick Kroll, James Franco, Michael Cera, Anders Holm, Danny McBride, David Krumholtz, Lauren Miller, Edward Norton, Harland Williams
Screenplay: Kyle Hunter, Ariel Shaffir, Seth Rogen & Evan Goldberg
Music Score by: Christopher Lennertz & Alan Menken
Cinematography: NA
Cinematography: NA
Edited by: Kevin Pavlovic
Running Time: 89 minutes
Language: English
Rated: R16 - Stacks of Profanity, Sexual Content and Food Violence!
Running Time: 89 minutes
Language: English
Rated: R16 - Stacks of Profanity, Sexual Content and Food Violence!
As you would expect from Rogen, Jonah Hill, Evan Goldberg, Craig Robinson and the crew this is no PG Pixar affair.... far from it.
Like "Deadpool" before it parents now have another movie over which they will be breaking bad news to their kids who desparatley want to see it because it just looks so cute and funny.
"Sausage Party" is certainly one of those things.
Imagine if food could think.
What would it make of the world as it sits on supermarkets shelves waiting to be purchased and taken away?
That is the central idea behind "Sausage Party".
The food - everything from condiments to snacks to fruits and vegetables to of course the sausages of the title have reached a consensus.
They all believe that the main doors of the supermarket lead to the Great Beyond - Heaven itself inhabited by Gods (that would be people) who will grant them eternal life and happiness.
All that they need is to be selected.
While they wait Frank the Sausage and Brenda the hotdog bun have fallen in love and cannot wait to be united, outside of their packaging in the Great Beyond.
But word comes in the form of a returned jar of Honey Mustard (Danny McBride) that the Great Beyond is a great lie.
It is a horror show filled with violence and death and hunger.
 |
| Food finds out that it isn't heaven that lies beyond the supermarket doors in "Sausage Party" |
"Sausage Party" - and I can hardly believe that I am typing this - is a metaphor for religious belief.
There is even a bagel and a lavash (a Turkish flatbread) that stand in for Jewish and Palestinian enemies.
The bagel named Sammy Davis Jr is voiced by Edward Norton who delivers an uncanny Woody Allen impression while David Krumholtz ("Serenity") voices the lavash - Kareem Abdul Lavash.
The back and forth between the two is pretty blatant in its intention but it is wonderfully funny.
Then there is the frequent flirting amidst ever growing sexual frustration between Frank and Brenda who cannot wait to get together in the manner that a sausage and bun do when a hotdog is made.
They satisfy themselves somewhat with a 'just the tip' moment - their fingers brushing together.
You may be getting the idea that this movie isn't subtle and it would be an understatement to say that it isn't.
The language is raw from the get-go with frequent f-bombs and even a c word chucked in for good measure.
It is exactly what you would expect from the guys who gave us "This Is the End", "Pineapple Express" and "Superbad".
"Sausage Party" isn't as funny as at least two of those but in many ways it is smarter.
There is a brilliant "Saving Private Ryan" parody as a bunch of food falls from a shopping trolley.
Done in desaturated colours it shows a shellshocked Oreo cookie looking for its missing rear biscuit, a can of spaghetti in distress as its contents spill out of a gash in the can like intestines and the trolley rolling in like a German tank crushing unlucky foodstuffs under wheel.
It is a fabulously bang on piss take and very, very good.
Likewise the characterisation is spot on.
Frequently I was impressed that a piece of food had had characteristics applied to it that seemed obvious in hindsight.
The liquor products are all party mad fools, ethnic foodstuffs adopt country of origin accents and often attire and a feminine hygiene product voiced by Nick Kroll is a foul mouthed pervert obsessed with fulfilling its um... design purpose.
There is an ongoing gag that uses a food based figure of speech like 'How do you like them apples?' to which the matching foodstuff will pipe up with an answer.
 |
| The terrified Honey Mustard (left) and the brilliant Saving Private Ryan parody (right) |
It all starts to unfold in the final act however and there I got the feeling that the writers had no idea how to wrap things up so they just went completely over the top.
It may seem a strange criticism for a dirty movie about talking food but up until the climax the film had been very successful at creating its own form of realism inside the world it had built.
The ending just runs roughshod over all of this good work and frequently left me amazed with its breaking of the fourth wall and ultimately unsatisfying conclusion.
There are also some underused and misused characters and voice actors.
Salma Hayek's randy Taco barely raises a laugh and doesn't further the plot one jot.
Jonah Hill's sausage Carl is similarly poorly served. This character seems to exist to give Hill a part more than to advance the story or provide humour.
When the film turns really dirty it appears to be attempting to out gross-out "Team America: World Police" with its orgiastic sex scene but it isn't a patch on Trey Parker and Matt Stone's classic scene of perverted doll rumpy-pumpy.
Also any time human characters feature heavily the film takes a comedy hit. These characters are best used as straight men for the food and they don't work when used front and centre.
But still- all criticisms aside - this is a comedy and as such it delivers plenty of laughs.
 |
| The cast features some of the best comedy talent in the business -(centre) Kristen Wiig and Bill Hader |
It is different - very different.
Generally the animated movies that make money these days are either the forgetful fish and talking toys of Pixar or the goofy Minions and chatty pets of Illumination Studios.
On a fraction of the budget Sony's "Sausage Party" is nowhere near as technically accomplished as the work of either but they have offered up the perfect antidote for an older audience looking for something edgier and funnier.
"Sausage Party" is certainly both of those things.
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