Team America: World Police

[drscott]

I met excessor at the gym and (after dinner at Togos, big spenders that we are) we went to the movies.

I laughed almost the whole way through, except for a draggy bit (the Hollywood actors aren't that funny.) A number of people left the theater -- there was plenty of highly offensive material, from puppet sex to puke humor and general iconoclasm for shock value. I even heard my inner prude (who's generally pretty quiet these days) niggling at me not to enjoy certain jokes too much, but crude comedy won out. A lot of Airplane-like moments and pop culture references. The overall Jerry Bruckheimer parody was pretty good... actually it was almost as easy to take it seriously as one of those. It was helpful to have excessor next to me to point out some details I would have missed, like the Parisian street being cobblestoned with little croissants. I doubt if the movie will have legs, since all the hardcore fans will see it in the first week or two, and general audiences won't understand how brilliant these guys are. I guess I am unusually flexible for someone pushing 50 -- although I've never been able to get into rap or Beavis and Butthead, these guys are genuinely creative, in a cheerfully anarchic way that an older generation won't be able to appreciate.

Oh, and there's lots of gay content, most of it offensive. And funny.

Comments

[excessor.livejournal.com]

First, let me say that even moi had difficulty with some parts. The gay humor is indeed offensive. Aren't Parker and Stone gay, too? And yet, I laughed the whole way through, too.

Most offensive was how the Hollywood actors were treated—and yet, I couldn't help but to agree with a lot of it. Except for mistreating Susan Sarandon.

The slapstick humor was magnificent, if sparser than for my tastes. I know, I know, your sense of humor is on a higher plane than mine.

I loved the Kim Jong-Il moments. The songs were funny. And there was a surprising number of Star Wars references. All in all, lots of fun.

[dr-scott.livejournal.com]

I think the Hollywood actors were a distraction at least in part because 1) Their puppets weren't very good likenesses, generally, and 2) their voices were badly done by the auteurs. Except for Michael Moore and Sean Penn, you'd never be able to recognize them. Had professional voice imitators been called in, they would have been more effective. This is aside from the bizarre plot device of having them in league with Kim Jung-Il.