The
food items at the supermarket named Shopwell's are excited about the
prospects of the annual '4th of July' sale, where many of them get
chosen by the 'gods' to go to the promised land of the "Great Beyond."
The most excited are the members of a package of ten phallic sausages,
especially Frank (voiced by Rogen,
Neighbors 2), who becomes enamored of what he hopes will be his
future companion, Brenda (Wiig,
Ghostbusters), who is one of a collection of eight vulvic
hot dog buns. As luck would have it, the god selects both of
their respective packages, but a returned jar of honey mustard warns
them of the horrors that await them all once they leave the store
(i.e., getting sliced, diced, cooked and consumed), leading to a
series of events that has Frank, Brenda, and company out of the
packages and on to a crazy odyssey as they mill about within the
store.
The funny bone is in the arm of the beholder, and certainly there will
be a share of the viewing audience who will come away loving
Sausage Party and its brand of rude, crude, and largely
distastefully vulgar humor (warning: do not bring the kids), primarily
because they find those aspects funny in and of themselves.
However, you won't be able to count me among them; I laughed only
once, possibly only to test if I still had the ability (the meatloaf
sings, "I Would Do Anything for Love" -- yeah, I'm embarrassed I
laughed too). While I do admire Rogen, Goldberg and the rest for
coming up with an inventive new way to deliver their gleefully
sophomoric brand of 'bro'-based comedy to the big screen, no amount of
CG-infused character designs and cartoony environs can cover over the
fact that this is merely the same recycled sexual, scatological and
stoner gags they've made their bread and butter since day one.
Despite its 'mature' rating, this is about as 'juvenile' as films get.
Sausage Party is directed by Conrad Vernon (Shrek 2,
Madagascar 3) and Greg Tiernan (who you may be shocked to learn
has directed many episodes of the very kid-oriented "Thomas and
Friends"), based on a script from Rogen and Goldberg, plus Kyle Hunter
and Ariel Shaffir (who helped Goldberg pen the script for the Rogen
vehicle, The Night Before). There appears to be a
not-terribly subtle allegory about issues of sexual guilt and
repression, class and religious segregation (represented by Woody
Allen-aping Sammy Bagel Jr. and Lavash the Arab-stereotype flatbread),
and the faith-based appeal of (and subsequent disfavor for) an
afterlife, using food as the metaphors, but outside of using these
aspects as excuses for crass and borderline-obscene dick-and-fart
jokes, there doesn't seem to be a prevailing sociopolitical itch to
scratch on the minds of the film's creative team. (I've heard of
film's being labeled as 'food porn' but this one takes the term to
another level.)
Some will consider Sausage Party as a spoof of popular
animated films from the likes of Pixar and Disney, but I would caution
not to expect an out-and-out satire. There are a few moments
that may echo some of the things you might see in one of those
all-ages films (such as musical numbers co-written by Disney regular,
Alan Menkin), the movie employs more of a kitchen-sink approach to
comedy, willing to do and say pretty much anything to try to elicit
laughs from audiences coming in fully expecting at least a dozen solid
guffaws. While I've already alluded to the fact that those
laughs didn't come for me (perhaps because I watched the film
completely straight and sober, unlike many of the film-going public in
the theater around me), there are also too many elements where the
film is clearly trying to be so-crude-it's-funny but actually made me
sink into further depression.
One such story element deals with a feminine hygiene product named, of
course, Douche, whose over-amped temper and vengeful megalomania is
meant to give the film the semblance of a villain, but is completely
unnecessary and generally detracts from the semblance of bratty cheer
that the rest of the film feels built upon. Rogen and company
just think the fact that he's a douche is automatically funny; if it
were anything else, it would cease to have a reason to exist in this
film. The faux-shocking ethnic-based elements are really for
those who laugh at anything deliberately un-PC, such as the
Firewater-brand whiskey bottle represented as a stereotypical "injun",
a tequila bottle who is a lusty, mustachioed Mexican, or the Grits
being a black who hates the 'crackers', a lesbian taco who wants
Brenda's 'buns', or the German food-stuffs led by a Hitler-like
sauerkraut who wanted to exterminate the 'juice'. Just as with
most components of Sausage Party, a little bit goes a long
way. Had this been a 10-minute film, it would be an instant hit
among many, but at 90 minutes, the hit-and-miss nature of the comedy,
plus the scattershot nature of its story, produces a few prolonged
lulls.
If you're someone who enjoys F-bombs so liberally employed they almost
seem forced in on the chance they might break some sort of record for
animated obscenities, who guffaws at any instance in which racial,
gender and sexual stereotypes are exploited for laughs independent of
how clever they are beyond their perceived naughtiness, or who
relishes any and every opportunity for someone to throw in a grossly
imagined double entendre, by all means, seek out Sausage Party,
as it is chock full of this level of raunch for raunch's sake. While
the idea of Sausage Party is amusing, unfortunately, the
reality of actually sitting through it once you settle in to the
premise is a tough sell. However, the film does pack quite a crescendo
for an orgiastic closing act, which will possibly be just enough to
have paying audiences walking out still snickering at what they've
seen, perhaps enough to forgive most of the scattershot and very
repetitious nature of what has come before.
If you're cordially invited to this party full of sausages, just know
that this invitation will come enclosed in an envelope that is
persistently pushed throughout.
Qwipster's rating
:
©2016 Vince Leo
