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Review of Team America World Police
The movie is essentially a parody of your standard summer blockbuster. In this case we have "Team America", the stereotypical hodge podge band of freedom fighters brought together to kick ass (not surprisingly) for America and for Freedom. It turns out that marionettes are the ideal vehicle for such a film: the summer blockbuster genre has at its very core the super huge special effect. A parody would be hard pressed to convincingly duplicate these effects. But these are puppets. So the effects are supposed to look silly. And this is fortunate: the film takes constant blissful pleasure in the blockbuster tradition of demolishing national monuments, from the Eiffel tower to Mount Rushmore.
Our team of freedom fighters hits all the standard cliche's: we lose a member, find a replacement, who gets jaded and ultimately must come to terms with his feelings about his job while the team comes to accept the new guy.
Of course, there is some sort of a plot as well. In South Park the movie, Parker used Saddam Hussein as his evil joke. This time it's Kim Jong-il. He's really no different than Saddam was last time around. Just a ludicrous bad guy. In this case he's busy masterminding a stupid plot where he unifies the hollywood liberals and various terrorist organization as part of your standard wreck the world plan. It's thin, but no thinner than what it parodies.
I think my general concern going into this movie was the politics. The movie could very easily get mired down in preaching a point. But thankfully it never really does that. It simultaneously makes fun of liberal hollywood actors, and the rah rah 'Go America' right wing stereotype. But the movie isn't really picking sides: it's more about parodying the genre of summer blockbuster then it is about right vs left or war vs peace. Thats a good thing. Parker has proven time and time again that he can make simple points very well. South Park has addressed countless social issues over the years, and the feature film really took issues like censorship and parenting in a very meaningful way. Team America doesn't spend much time trying to seriously address the issues. It's just simple fun.
The other major concern that I harbored was that the marionette jokes would run thin. As I said before, the use of marionettes works great for mocking special effects, but the film easily could have constantly referred back to the fact that we are watching puppets. There are only a few jokes like that. Since they are used so sparingly, they make it all the more amusing when it happens. And there's a lot of hilarity to be derived from puppet sex when the film is pretending to be serious about it.
Like all of Parker's movies, they come out guns blazing, and 30 minutes in, I find myself needing a commercial break. The jokes are constant and funny. Maybe too funny. By the middle of the film you see something funny but are so desensitized that it's tough to muster another laugh. Of course then they turn around and beat you over the head with something new.
It's also worth noting that the facial puppetteering is really cool. Everyone involved should be really proud of themselves for pulling off something so visually unique.
I really enjoyed the film. I went in with high hopes and was pleased to have them all met. Even my wife, who is quite sick of South Park and wasn't looking forward to watching this at all came out absolutely giddy with laughter.
If you're a South Park fan, you'll love this movie. If you're a fan of summer blockbusters, and can tolerate the language, you'll love this movie. If you're a prude, watch something else. As for me, this is the first movie in months that I decided to buy the DVD before it was over.
Team America
http://www.busyweather.com/
If anyone has the chance, check out "Cannibal: The Musical", by Trey and Matt. It's surprisingly good...VERY catchy music numbers ("Let's Build a Snowman!" and "A Schplodoinkel Day" (?) are two faves). It drags a bit in parts, but you can always turn on the drunken commentary for those sections.
Salon has an interview with Tray and Matt about this where they talk about their intent and how people react to the movie.
Sean Penn's a bit peeved.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
Shouldn't you mention that you were paid for this review? (I dunno if it was free tickets or paid advertising, but it was a 'forced' review).
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Nah, he also said "Thats a good thing."
Sorry to reply to myself, but I didn't include the link with the original news story about the NC-17.
:).
" Puppet oral sex goes against grain for US censors "
I have that link (and others) in my own write-up, but I realize that not everyone is going to read that. So now you have the separate link
- Neil Wehneman
My legal education, in nifty podcast format
we got a movie based on politics that really doesn't have a bias or an op-ed piece, and just around Election Day. It's just a movie making fun of everyday politics and the current events that we face. Sometimes we just have to look at what's going on and laugh instead of picking sides and blaming people for it.
Trey Parker makes fun of left and right because he thinks they are both stupid. That's right, folks -- Trey Parker is a Libertarian. And you thought Libertarians couldn't be funny!
Software Wars
You don't make a plural with an apostrophe!
To find and fix the many other problems, run the spelling and grammar checker in Word.
How ya like dat?
I think you mean Orgazmo, and Amazon has a few copies left: Amazon Link.
...number of brain cells..."?
Just wondering.
Parker directs AND produces, Stone just produces...
-psy
interesting, I can watch quicktime format on everything from linux to BSD to BeOS
your savoir is called mplayer, and specifically the mplayer mozilla plugin.
instead of bitching, try looking for solutions next time.
Here's the context that gad zuki! left out:
[snip]
Stone: And the whole voting thing. All we ever said was that we thought that uninformed people should not vote -- on either side of the political spectrum. It doesn't matter who you're gonna vote for. If you really don't know who you're gonna vote for, or are uninformed, or haven't really thought about it? Just stay home. Don't let people fucking shame you into going to the polls.
Parker: If you have absolutely no idea, fuck it.
Stone: If you really don't know or you're just going to vote for George Bush because he's already in office, or you're gonna vote for John Kerry because he's on the cover of Rolling Stone, don't do that. That's lame. Just stay home. That's all we ever said.
[/snip]
I've heard some talk on NPR about this, about how MTV is running ads about voting like they are shaving cream commercials. I'm all for "get out the vote" campaigns, but I personally feel like being educated on the candidates and issues is important too.
Do we really want people who don't feel like learning about the candidates and issues voting on these things? I've voted in every election since 1988, and when I hit something on a ballot that I don't know anything about (usually local races that I have not followed), I don't vote. I don't think this is such a heinous idea - that you should only cast informed votes...
'So I haven't seen the movie, but I understand in the end it somewhat comes out in favor of America being "world police"'
How do you understand that without seeing the movie? What makes you think they believe anything Drudge posts? You're talking out of your ass here.