Hot on the heels of family-friendly cartoons like Zootopia, The Secret Life of Pets and Finding Dory comes an animated movie that definitely isn’t for the whole family… unless it’s the Manson Family.
The high concept of Seth Rogen’s NSFW Sausage Party was, I think, best summed up by twitter user @ByChrisSmith who wrote, “So that Sausage Party trailer… Toy Story for food with swears?”
It’s the kind of food porn you won’t see on the Food Network. “We started to think ‘What if food had feelings?’ said Rogen after a sneak preview at the South By Southwest Film Festival. “That really is what inspired the whole idea: What if food thought one thing happened and discovered another thing happened?”
The story begins at a supermarket called Shopwell’s. Frank the Sausage (voice of Rogen), his hot dog bun girlfriend Brenda (Kristen Wiig) and all the other foods—including Mr. Grits (Craig Robinson), a tomato (Paul Rudd) and Teresa the Taco (Salma Hayek)—live in hope that one day a customer will choose them. When they find out what happens after the customer takes them home, however, they fight to avoid their fate.
R-rated and raunchy, Rogen says he showed an early cut of the film to Borat star Sacha Baron Cohen. “Sausage Party appalled him in some ways,” adding that Cohen, cinema’s reigning Prince of Provocation, called the movie “the craziest thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”
Someone who might not have been surprised by Sausage Party is Ralph Bakshi, a legendary animator who once said, “None of my pictures were anything I could ever take my mother to see. You know it’s working if you’re making movies you don’t want to your mother to see.”
Bakshi began his career his career in traditional animation, working for Terrytoons, home to cartoon characters like Heckle and Jeckle and Mighty Mouse but left television to make first animated film to receive an X-rating from the MPAA. Loosely based on a character created by cartoonist Robert Crumb, who later disavowed the film, 1972s Fritz the Cat is a trippy counterculture flick about a streetwise feline who smokes dope and has run ins with the Hell’s Angels and the Black Panthers. Extremely controversial—New York Times critic Vincent Canby wrote, “[there’s] something to offend just about everyone”—it became the first independent animated film to gross more than $100 million at the box office.
More adult animation came with the R-rated Heavy Metal. An anthology made up of eight stories bound together by an intergalactic traveller described as the sum of all evil, the movie’s tagline promises to take audiences “beyond the future into a universe you’ve never seen before. A universe of mystery. A universe of magic. A universe of sexual fantasies. A universe of awesome good. A universe of terrifying evil.” Rotten Tomatoes calls the movie “sexist, juvenile, and dated,” but says it “makes up for its flaws with eye-popping animation and a classic, smartly-used soundtrack.”
Both Fritz the Cat and Heavy Metal were successful enough to spawn sequels. The Nine Lives of Fritz the Cat and Heavy Metal 2000 both tried and failed to recapture the success of the originals. When asked if there might be a sequel to Sausage Part Rogen said, “What’s better than one sausage? That would be dope. All we do are franchises now.”
“Sausage Party,” the new animated film for adults from Seth Rogen, is the kind of food porn you won’t see on the Food Network. The high concept of this NSFW cartoon is, I think, best summed up by twitter user @ByChrisSmith who wrote, “So that Sausage Party trailer… ‘Toy Story’ for food with swears?” It’s that for sure—don’t take the kids—but it’s more than just a one-joke double entendre about wieners and buns.
The story begins at a supermarket called Shopwell’s. While on the store’s shelves Frank the Sausage (voice of Rogen) and his hot dog bun girlfriend Brenda (Kristen Wiig) live in hope that one day they will ascend to the “Great Beyond” and finally consummate their relationship. “When a bun this fresh is into you,” says Frank, “all you say is when.”
After a jar of Honey Mustard (Danny McBride) is returned to the store he relays horrifying stories about what actually happens to food on the outside. When they are finally chosen, ie: thrown into a shopping cart by the “gods,” Honey Mustard sets them off on an existential journey when he leaps out of the cart. “There ain’t no way I’m going back,” he screams as he splats on the floor. Left in the grocery aisle, Frank and Brenda, along side Sammy Bagel Jr. (Edward Norton doing his best Woody Allen impression) and a Middle Eastern pastry named Lavash (David Krumholtz), try to find out if the gods really are the bloodthirsty animals Honey Mustard described in grim detail. Outside Shopwell’s Frank’s friends—like the hapless Barry Sausage (Michael Cera)—try and make their way back to safety on the store’s shelves.
Is “Sausage Party” OK for kids? Let’s get this out of the way first. It looks like a children’s flick. The wieners are adorable and the other characters—including Mr. Grits (Craig Robinson) and Teresa del Taco (Salma Hayek)—look like they wouldn’t be out of place in a movie like “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs,” but make no mistake, this is not for the little ones. Why? I can sum it up in three words: used talking condom. And that is the least of the adult material. This is über-NSFW and will likely blister the ears of anyone not accustomed to Rogen’s liberal use of the seven words you can never say on television.
So, no children, but will adults like this? It depends on how adult you want to be. The film isn’t as funny as you might expect, given its pedigree. Written by the team behind the very amusing “The Night before” and “This is the End,” it is intermittently hilarious but as often as not it relies on juvenile outrageousness rather than actual wit. The idea of cursing bagels and sexualized tacos quickly wears thin but it is the film’s sheer audaciousness that keeps it interesting. A treatise on everything from cultural relations to gen pop’s tendency to take the easy way out, it’s a timely look at Trump Time, the unique moment in our history when belief outdoes facts. The food items are so pliable that the words to their national anthem, a wild psalm to celebrate the “gods” written by Disney stalwart Alan Menken, change as political affiliations change. “Today was there a verse about exterminating juice?” asks Firewater (Bill Hader).
“Sausage Party,” with all its unhinged humour may be the most subversive movie of the Trump candidacy. There are no walls here, just the barrier of a somewhat self-indulgent, silly story that values cussing as much as the jokes. On the plus side, however, it relishes its ideas and there is no expiration date on its message of unity over division.
Comic books and graphic novels have provided the inspiration for loads of movies but rarely does a film really capture the spirit of its pen and ink muse. “Sin City” used a mixture of live action and digital trickery to bring its film noir story to visceral life and the “Spider-Man” series wisely focused on the characters for their big screen outings but “Scott Pilgrim vs. The World” is the evolution of both these techniques. Director Edgar “Sean of the Dead” Wright strikes a balance between live action, manga, video game imagery and music videos to conjure up a wildly entertaining, if some what sensory assaulting pop culture confection that works as a film and stays true to the source material.
Based on Bryan Lee O’Malley’s graphic novel series, “Scott Pilgrim vs. The World” stars Michael Cera as Scott Pilgrim, a 22-year-old Torontonian who is rebound dating a 17-year-old high school girl named Knives Chau (Ellen Wong). Knives loves Scott and his band, but Scott only has eyes for Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), a recently transplanted New Yorker whose habit of changing her hair color from shocking pink to blue to green every week leads Scott to believe she is unpredictable. He may be right, but her fickle behavior is the least of his problems. As soon as they start dating he discovers he has to pass a test—actually seven of them—if he wants to be with her. He must first defeat her Seven Evil Exes in wild video game meets “The Matrix” fights scenes.
The experience of watching “Scott Pilgrim vs. The World” is not unlike that sonic rush that accompanies walking into a videogame arcade. It’s noisy, flashy and somewhat disorienting. Director Wright flips from scene to scene with the speed of light, filling the screen with sight gags, surreal graphics flying on and off the screen and much visual mayhem.
It’s nonstop but unlike movies that are all style and no substance the look of the film is crucial to the spirit of the story. Some suspension of disbelief will be necessary when watching the movie—extras lives can be gained à la video game rules—but the underlying reason for all this flash is Scott’s journey toward self awareness. He’s a video game nerd and a comic book geek whose life is marked by the constant flow of information and stimulation that we’re all inundated with every day and the movie’s hyperactive style inventively portrays that world.
It’s a cool looking movie but that doesn’t mean that much if the characters aren’t engaging, and here again Wright steps up. Cera (the year’s most unlikely movie warrior) is treading familiar ground here—the sweet geek—but brings with him razor sharp comic timing and a likeable screen presence. His realization that you must fight for what you believe in and those you love may be presented in an outrageous fashion, but the underlying message is bang on.
“Scott Pilgrim vs. The World” is a unique piece of work. It’s a wild ride that nails the pop culture zeitgeist but also tells a universal human story.
Superbad is Porky’s for a new generation. It’s a throwback to the teen comedies we used to love before John Hughes got his hands on the genre and smoothed out the rough edges. It’s rude, has no boundaries and is laugh out loud funny.
Seth (Jonah Hill) and Evan (Brampton, Ontario born Michael Cera) are BFFs with just weeks to go before their high school graduation. In the waning days of their high school careers they decide to launch a full scale mission to land girlfriends and get some much needed experience with the opposite sex before heading to college in the fall.
When the class hottie Jules invites them to a party, they’re thrilled. There’s just one problem, she asks them to bring alcohol. That’s were their nerdy friend Fogell (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) come in. He’s the classic pencil necked geek and a chick repellant, but he’s the only one with a fake ID and access to booze.
The bulk of the film follows the exploits of this trio as they try and score alcohol so they can in turn score some girls. Underage, but blinded by their sex drives, they risk it all against slacker cops, a maniacal homeless man and jealous boyfriends to track down booze for their dates. It’s the stuff that parent’s nightmares are made of.
Superbad is shouldn’t work as well as it does. It’s the kind of coming-of-age flick Hollywood has been churning out for years, but it has a few things going for it that make it worthwhile.
First, it was co-written by Knocked Up’s Seth Rogen, who also plays one of the cops. Rogen and childhood pal Evan Goldberg penned Superbad while still in high school, and like Knocked Up the raunchy humor here plays off the more human aspect of the relationships between the friends. The kids in American Pie were funny, but unrealistic in unrealistic situations. Ditto Road Trip and most other teen comedies made in the last ten years, but Superbad succeeds because it treats its characters like real people—albeit real people who do crazy things because they are ruled by their hormones.
The script is smart and funny, the direction solid, but it is the three lead actors, Hill, Cera and Mintz-Plasse that really sell this movie. Hill’s comic timing is bang on; Cera, so excellent as George Michael on the late, great Arrested Development is in top deadpan form as the straight-laced Evan while Mintz-Plasse, in his first acting role, could give Anthony Michael Hall a run for his money as the King of the Movie Nerds. These three play off one another really well, building a believable relationship that is by turns hilarious, by turns touching, but above all convincing.
Super funny, and super vulgar, Superbad is the funniest movie I’ve seen in a long time. I’m McLovin’ It! (You’ll have to see the movie to get the joke.)
In Youth in Revolt, Brampton, Ontario-born actor Michael Cera plays an anachronistic Frank Sinatra fan who falls for the anachronistic Jean-Paul Belmondo loving girl who lives next door at the trailer park.
When circumstance steps in to keep them apart he — with the help of an imaginary friend named Francois Dillinger — changes his life to be with her.
Cera admits the idea of having one of his favourite books pared down from 500 pages to a 90-minute script made him nervous, but he couldn’t resist the opportunity to sign on to the project.
“I just love the book,” he says. “It’s very cinematic and I thought the humour of the book would work very well on screen. That was the thought behind the movie; to capture the humour on screen.
“You can’t tell the whole story of the book because it is so huge, but the book exists for that reason. The book is its own enjoyment.”
His character, Nick Twisp, appealed to the actor because it had a ring of authenticity often missing from teen comedies.
“I love the voice of the character,” he said, “and it’s nice when you’re reading the book because you’re reading his journal, so you are really tapping right into his mind. It feels like you are feeling the thought process of the author. I connected with that.
“The character was real,” he said. “C.D. Payne wrote it really personally. It felt like he wrote it in his own voice. He wasn’t trying to write like a fourteen year old kid. He didn’t add in any false naiveté or didn’t try and sound less intelligent he was just writing and it was personal. I think that’s why people connect to things; when they feel personal.”
Cera hopes audiences will relate to Youth in Revolt. “I hope maybe people will feel inspired,” he says. “That would be the best case scenario. That’s the best feeling I have walking out of the movies. That’s a hard thing to accomplish but it is special when it happens.”
Hoodie heartthrob Michael Cera doesn’t know who Jack Benny is. When I mention that Cera’s style puts me in the mind of Benny’s trademarked deadpan comedy the Brampton-born actor says, politely, “I’ve never gotten too familiar with Jack Benny.”
After a description of Benny’s low-key approach to selling a joke, Cera chimes in, “That’s such a secret in comedy. Charles Grodin is such an inspiration to me because he is so small, and yet you see everything he does. It’s really perfect and just enough.”
In Youth in Revolt, his third TIFF film (he was here with Juno in ’07, and with Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist in ’08), Cera again displays his knack for subtle, gentle humour. He plays an anachronistic Sinatra-loving teenager who falls for the anachronistic Belmondo-loving girl who lives next door. When circumstance steps in to keep them apart, he changes his life to be with her.
For Cera the movie is a passion project.
“I just love the book,” he says. “It’s very cinematic and I thought the humour of the book would work very well on screen. That was the thought behind the movie; to capture the humour on screen. You can’t tell the whole story of the book because it is so huge, but the book exists for that reason. The book is its own enjoyment.”
His character, Nick Twisp, appealed to Cera because it had a ring of authenticity often missing from teen comedies.
“The character was real,” he said. “C.D. Payne wrote it really personally. It felt like he wrote it in his own voice. He wasn’t trying to write like a 14-year-old kid. He didn’t add in any false naiveté or didn’t try and sound less intelligent; he was just writing and it was personal. I think that’s why people connect to things; when they feel personal.”
Cera hopes audiences will connect with Youth in Revolt. “I hope maybe people will feel inspired,” he says. “That would be the best-case scenario … That’s a hard thing to accomplish but it is special when it happens.”
Youth in Revolt is the new Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. It’s a film about the benefits of behaving badly and like the famous 1986 John Hughes movie it is headlined by an actor who brings charm and wit to the role of the rebel.
Hoodie heartthrob Michael Cera plays fourteen-year-old Nick Twisp, a mild mannered collection of raging hormones and quirky personality traits. He loves Sinatra and foreign films. When his family relocates to a Christian trailer park he meets his dream girl, Sheeni Saunders (Portia Doubleday), a similarly anachronistic teenager with a taste for anything French and a dream of being swept off her feet by a bad boy named Francois. When circumstance steps in to keep them apart he (with the help of an imaginary friend named Francois Dillinger) reverses his goody-two-shoes image and becomes a rebel with a cause—he wants to impress her.
Cera has a corner on the awkward by coming-of-age movie, and as Twisp he doesn’t do anything he didn’t do in Juno or Superbad, but he’s charming and easy to watch. His work takes on a different dimension, however, when he slips into alter ego mode. As the mustachioed Francois he’s a refugee from a Belmondo film, equipped with a cigarette, and too tight white trousers. It’s not often that an actor gets to show his range playing two characters in one film, but this is a step forward for Cera, who has been locked into the wisecracking virgin stereotype since he left the small screen’s Arrested Development, grew some peach fuzz and started chasing girls on the big screen. It’s not exactly his first adult part but it shows he can do something other than act like an awkward teen while delivering funny lines with pitch perfect timing.
The supporting cast, made up of reliable old pros like Jean Smart, M. Emmet Walsh, Fred Willard and Steve Buscemi, do good work, but the movie wouldn’t work if Sheeni wasn’t the kind of girl worth throwing your life away for, but in the excellently named Portia Doubleday Youth in Revolt finds a newcomer with charisma to burn.
Youth in Revolt is a funny, delightful movie but its main strengths are its actors—Cera who expands his range and Doubleday who debuts hers.
Lately we’ve seen lots of origin movies. Hugh Jackman starred in a blockbuster about the beginnings of his most famous character, Wolverine and Iron Man gave us the skinny on how Robert Downey Jr became a superhero. Now Jack Black and Michael Cera star in the mother of all origin movies. Year One is a Biblical satire that picks up where movies like The Life of Brian left off, bringing a modern sensibility to a story about the foundation of our civilization.
Black and Cera play Zed and Oh, hunter-gatherers banished from their village in biblical times. Cut off from all they know the pair meander through Old Testament era Mesopotamia, get sold into slavery, narrowly avoid the first circumcision and bump into everyone from Cain and Abel (David Cross and Paul Rudd) to Abraham (Hank Azaria). Eventually they try and rescue their old village-mates in the city where “the sinners are winners,” the doomed Sodom.
Much of the humor in Year One comes from Black and Cera dressing like hunter gatherers but speaking like a modern day odd couple. For example, when village leader Marlak (Matthew Willig) knocks a bowl of strawberries from Oh’s hand, Cera replies, “Well there won’t be any berries in the fruit salad now, so we all lose.” The anachronistic language is funny and the talented cast pulls it off, but I’m afraid there isn’t much more here than that.
Black and Cera bring their well defined comic personas—Black is the overconfident dumb guy, Cera the nerdy outsider—and both seem to have fun with their roles, but the ratio of laughs per minute isn’t as high as some other recent movies, most notably The Hangover. It’s a feel good movie, but not exactly a laugh-a-rama.
Part of the problem is the script. The thinly written story—it feels more like a series of skits than a whole—relies on the two leads to squeeze every last bit of charm from a script heavy with poo jokes, sex humor and all other forms of juvenilia, and for the most part they do, but Black’s mugging and Cera’s patented passiveness grow old by the time the credits roll.
Fortunately an all star list of cameos brightens things up a bit. Hank Azaria as Abraham brings the funny and Black’s Tenacious D sidekick Kyle Gass raises a smile as Zaftig the Eunuch. Both these supporting characters seem ripped out of another movie, a funnier movie. I left wondering what someone like Mel Brooks could have done with this material. I mean is there a more perfect Brooks character name than Zaftig the Eunuch?
Year One’s immature yuks should amuse fans of Jack Black and Michael Cera and it will offend some but leave most with only a faint smile.
As an audience member “Crystal Fairy” feels like you’ve arrived at the frat party a few hours too late. You’re sober, everyone else is drunk and the most interesting thing that is going to happen will be watching your friends stagger around until the fighting or crying starts.
Michael Cera plays against the meek nerd character he’s established in movies like “Juno,” “Superbad” and on television in “Arrested Development.” Here he plays Jamie, an aggressive American in Chile with a group of friends (played by director Sebastián Silva and his real life brothers) on a Hunter S. Thompson style quest for a local shamanistic hallucinogen called the San Pedro Cactus. The road trip to the ultimate drug trip isn’t easy going, however. The tightly wound Jamie’s pushy behavior is harshing their vibe and when he inadvertently invites uber-hippie Crystal Fairy (Gaby Hoffmann) along for the ride, the journey turns into a long, strange trip indeed.
Plotless and idea driven rather than motivated by story, “Crystal Fairy” coasts along on the charm of Cera and Hoffman. Both hand in memorable, hard-to-forget performances, but the movie meanders so much—which I guess is to be expected from a psychotropic road movie—that the truly interesting and revealing character moments get washed away by the tedium of the scenes that surround them.
By Richard Crouse – Metro In Focus 
