Movie of the Week: Sausage Party

Alexa: I’m typically a big fan of Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg’s collaborations, and while I think “Sausage Party” is one of their weaker - and most bizarre - offerings, I have to say… I didn’t hate it. The movie certainly has its share of problems, chief among them that for a film billed as a comedy, it didn’t have strong jokes. I chuckled at a few moments throughout, but “Superbad”-level hilarious this movie is not. It’s often over-the-top obscene even for a raunch comedy. And that ending - it completely lost me there. But the premise intrigued me more than I was expecting. It wants to do for Disney/Pixar what “Avenue Q” did for Sesame Street. It’s nowhere close to being as masterful as that, but it does have a certain cleverness to it. The Disney-esque opening number was great (bonus points for actually securing Alan Menken, the king of Disney music, to write it). The “Saving Private Ryan” homage was pretty sharp. And never would I ever have expected a movie called “Sausage Party” to have so much to say about religion, cultural appropriation and prejudice, even if it didn’t always know how it wanted to say it. So kudos to Rogen and Goldberg for trying something different, I suppose. The pieces of a truly clever concept are there, but unfortunately those pieces never quite fall into place.

But “Nerdland” is worse. Sorry, Joel.

Joel: We’ve seen a fair number of bad movies so far this year watching Netflix movies. And when those came up, I’ve been more than willing to say that they were bad movies, even if they were my own picks. But I don’t think I go overboard with hyperbole when complaining about a bad movie. I want you to remember that when I tell you that Sausage Party is flat out one of the worst movies I have ever seen. From beginning to end this movie is insultingly bad.  

Sausage Party is a movie that tries to make a joke of “Hey what if those talking inanimate object movies that Pixar makes were for adults.” But that in an of itself it’s really a joke. It’s a premise. And one that the movie never does anything with. It exists on nothing more than the idea that it’s very existence is a joke meaning that the movie itself is nearly devoid of anything really resembling humor. So many of the jokes are nothing more than the “shocking” idea that these cartoon characters are swearing, and while that might have worked, or been actually shocking in any way in 1996, we are in a world where South Park has existed for twenty years now. Today there are more adult oriented animated movies and shows than you can keep track of. Sausage Party does nothing to stand out or be noteworthy, and it’s laziness towards its own premise is perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of it’s whole thing.

It’s like the entire movie tried to hide it’s half-assery behind the idea that it’s a joke. The animation is terrible and the character designs are ugly. “Oh it's supposed to be that way. As a joke. Because all Pixar movies look so pretty, it’s funny that this movie looks so terrible.” There are a lot of bad looking animated movies out there (Nerdland, a movie we watched earlier this year is a great example) but at least in most cases the bad animation is a result of a stylistic choice or creative attempt that didn’t work out in the final product. The animation style here is almost devoid of any stylistic choice other than whatever would be the easiest or cheapest to do. And speaking of cost, I have to mention how the low budget of the movie ($20 million) was brought up by the directors several times promoting this movie saying that “It doesn’t have to cost that much money when you’re well organized, and you have your mind set on the goal of what you want to do, and you get the job done with a small, determined crew.” Now I’m not one to argue against what amazing things can be done on a smaller budget, but it’s frustrating to hear this claim when watching the movie it’s clear that the low budget resulted in poorer quality animation, and then it comes to light that the movie’s low budget was achieved by forcing the animation team to work on the movie for free or not be credited for their work on the film and risk getting blacklisted from the industry. Seriously, you can look it up. There are at least 36 confirmed animators whose work appears in the final product of this movie, but who were removed from the credits and denied any association because they refused to work overtime for free on this movie.

But even if you’re able to get past all of that, you still have to suffer through that actual story, that this movie tries to tell before getting tired and giving up on itself halfway through. There are some half hearted attempts at things like religion and prejudice but the movie can’t decide what it actually wants to say on these topics ultimately deciding on nothing. The movie constantly contradicts itself rendering any idea it had pointless, by undercutting it with another conflicting idea. This is the movie version of a drunk frat boy who has made it through one philosophy class and it ready to change everybody’s worldview at the party whether they want him to or not.

I hate that this movie is as bad as it is, I really do. Like I said before, we are getting a chance to see more adult oriented animation now than ever before and I’m a big fan of it. I think that there are a lot of fantastic works out there and there is a lot more to be done with this genre. The problem is that plenty of people can’t look past the “cartoons that swear” concept to see anything of merit in animation for grownups. It’s why award winning and critically lauded programs and movies are still labeled as low brow garbage. And Sausage Party doesn’t try to be anything beyond that. I usually hope that people watch along with us. Even if it’s a movie I think is bad, I want you to read what we have to say, maybe give it a try and see how you feel. After all it’s free (if you have Netflix that is) but in this case, I hope that if you were on the fence here at all, I can convince you that taking any time out of your life to watch this movie is a terrible idea.

(Note: Most reviews of this movie will mention something mysterious about the ending of the movie, saying that it goes too far at the end or something like that. While I want to say that I agree the ending is terrible, pointless, unnecessary and many other things that you can find in a thesaurus, I don’t want it’s awful ending to distract from how bad the rest of the movie is as well)

Chris: Wow, will you look at that wall of text above me? Joel really got fired up about this movie and that's really the main reason why I've been holding onto this movie to put onto the schedule at the right moment. This was that moment, after Joel had us sit through Nerdland and the Hitler movie, I knew the time was now. This movie was first mentioned months ago when it first went onto Netflix, almost as a joke however, the reaction I got from Joel at the mere mention of the title made this movie as an absolute must for Movie of the Week. Did I act like I enjoyed this movie when I first saw it last year just to fire Joel up that much more so I get a salty wall of hate for us to enjoy? Maybe. I legitimately enjoyed it when I first saw it but I was also with a large group of people and there might have been some intoxicating elements involved. I will say this much, watching this movie alone in your room and you're completely sober, it's kind of a sad way to spend an evening. However, I don't quite think it's the catastrophe Joel makes it out to be and I hold firm to the notion that Nerdland was worse, Sausage Party didn't quite hold up in my head as I hazily remembered it. And yes, if they had spent some more money on it, the movie would've been more enjoyable at least from a visual standpoint. I'm gonna leave my review there because if you've made it this far, you're eyes are probably tired.

Jason: Once upon a time, we did a 13 days of Halloween movie list here on IBA. The day of Halloween, I chose the classic film The Nightmare Before Christmas. Our good friend and accomplice Chris decided that it was beneath him to watch this excellent movie. Instead, he wrote a review for Boogie Nights and posted that for the day. Well, this week, he has chosen a movie that I cannot, with good conscience, bring myself to view. I know that if I were to see it, I would never be able to UNsee it. And so, I now present you with my review of last year’s Korean smash horror hit, Train to Busan.

Some people say that zombies are worn out (no pun intended). And it is true that there has been a lot of zombie content to come out in the last decade or so. A lot of it can be lumped into the same pile of filler and knock-off cash-grab buy in. But there are some stand out products that really dig in and try to get it right. The first season of the Walking Dead nailed it,  the novel (NOT the movie) World War Z nailed it. And I feel that this movie nails it!

The zombies here are more of the Danny Boyle 28 Days/Weeks variety but here, they are put into a situation where their numbers and their speed mean very little. Being confined on a narrow, crowded train makes everything feel super claustrophobic even before the dead start rising and attacking. The narrative explores the themes of parenthood and responsibility from several different angles and shows the successes and failures of different approaches to these ideas. Maybe it’s because I, myself have recently become a father, but there were some bits that hit real close to home with me. I don’t cry during movies, like, ever. But the end of this one got me misty. Just the last scene really did me in.

This movie does not let up. Once the proverbial poop starts hitting the fan, it just piles up and up and there is no end in sight. Things just get worse until there is no hope left at all. That is how a zombie movie should go! Give me no escape. And if every single character dies, well that’s just how it goes.

I heard about this movie when it came out because of a few podcasts I listen to but I had not checked it out till now. I don’t know what I was waiting for but I’m glad I finally took the time to see it. If you are at all into zombies and all that, check this one out. You will not be disappointed.