A review by John Beachem
* * *
CAST Trey Parker, Matt Stone and Mary Kay Bergman perform almost all the voices
The is perhaps the first time I have ever been tempted to walk out of a movie, go to the box office, and demand half of my money back. The first half is really quite hysterical, and is very true to the television show (which I am a fan of). The second half, on the other hand, is awful. It spends the entire time attempting to insult everyone on the planet, and doing little else. I must say though, I think the film did pull off its goal in this department.
The plot revolves around Stan, Kyle, Cartmen, and Kenny (of course) sneaking into an R rated movie which stars their favorites Canadian television stars Terrence and Phillip. They come out of the film knowing a whole slew of bad words, which they proceed to use quite often in front of everyone including their parents. The parents (led by Kyle's mother) immediately blame the Canadians for this, and before you know it Canada and the US are at war. Meanwhile, Kenny, who died earlier of course, is down in hell with Satan and Satan's new lover, Saddam Hussein. The two of them are planning on taking over the earth, which will be made possible by the war above them for some reason. Kenny hears of these plans and tries to warn the others.
I think the main problem here, is that Trey Parker and Matt Stone are used to writing 30 minute television shows. In thirty minutes, they can throw in a thousand jokes and keep you laughing throughout the entire thing. Here, rather than simply spreading the jokes out a little thinner and keeping the audience at least chuckling through the film, they cram them all into the first 45 minutes or so. This of course makes those 45 minutes hilarious, but then the laughs suddenly stop. The theatre I was in was nearly silent for the entire last half of the movie.
I've heard people say that the film was blunt and honest, and said things that needed to be said. For the life of me, I can't think of what any of these things were. The only part that I thought was truly honest, and made sense was the little jab at the MPAA rating system. I believe the line was something like "they can have as much gore and violence as they want in movies, as long as they don't use any naughty words." I'd also better warn all you conservatives out there. Unless you can really take a joke well, stay far away from this film.
* * * * * - One of the greatest movies ever made, see it now. * * * * - Great flick, try and catch this one. * * * - Okay movie, hits and misses. * * - Pretty bad. See it if you've got nothing better to do. * - One of the worst movies ever. See it only if you enjoy pain.
E-mail with comments at: JABII@aol.com
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