Team America: World Police

This movie is crude, rude, politically incorrect, but hell yeah, a whole lot of fun! Well, what do you expect from the makers of South Park?

The setting of the movie is Today - in the wake of 9/11 and of transnational terrorism. Team America's the world police, equipped with "Thunderbirds"-like firepower and fancy transportation, whose mission is to strike at terrorists around the world. And what more, the main baddie's North Korea's Kim Jong Il and his band of middle eastern terrorist posse with WMD... hmm... a little too close to reality for comfort?

This film is so full of itself/America that it gets most of its laughs from there. From location settings that takes reference point from America, to the current inane insensitivity of American forces on foreign soil, to pointing fingers at bad Intelligence, it is all insane fun from the beginning when pandemonium strikes, that you start to wonder who actually does more damage - Team America, or the terrorists themselves.

Another highlight of this movie is the songs! When you first hear the Team America Theme, with it's "America! F* YEAH!", you know you'd had better pay attention to the lyrics of songs to come, some of which pokes fun at Pearl Harbour, pokes fun at film-making (the use of montages), and you even have Kim Jong Il doing a solo number! As with most slapstick comedies, sometimes you just gotta spoof some classics, which includes Star Wars, Matrix and Top Gun. Also, if you enjoy MTV's Celebrity Deathmatch, then you'll also enjoy the numerous fight sequences in Team America, which is just as creative in its decapitations, and as bloody.

Another infamous scene that got a lot of attention, was the sex scene between 2 lead puppets. It's no holds barred, puppetry porn. Whatever positions you can think of, it's mimicked on screen. Moreover, the conversational dialogue that led them to making love, is totally inane.

Look out for appearances by familiar Hollywood faces, and political figures like Hans Blix, Tony Blair, etc, used without their kind permission more like, as they're put in really bad, but hilarious, light.

America, F* YEAH!

It's not Gone With the Wind, but it is a great movie! Parker & Stone push the envelope again and again in this off the wall comedy that would make Jim Henson stand up and cheer. Any comedy that portrays Kim Jong Il as a lonely, confused and mad dictator deserves an audience. The creators of South Park pock fun at politics, celebrities, terrorism, James Bond, and puppets, while also creating a funny and well done musical soundtrack that is better than the South Park Musical / Comedy. Off the wall for most of the movie, the puppets having sex only is worth accepting this movie into the cinematic hall of fame. The vomit scene, the death of Kim Jong Il, the musical score, the montage parody and the production value are all worth it. A movie for all South Park fans, this blows (literally) Base-ket Ball out of the theater.

As much as I hate to admit it, Trey Parker and Matt Stone are actually quite talented in a sick twisted, strange, little way. After laughing my butt off during South Park Bigger, Longer & Uncut, I couldn't wait to see this movie. I was not disappointed.

This could be by far the funniest film this year. The plot is easy to follow, as it borrows from most action flicks you see these days, but the way in which it is made is incredible. The fact that these are puppets is enough to make you laugh throughout the entire film. The jokes are funny and don't fall flat. As I was watching the opening, I thought it might run out of steam as it went on. My ticket said it went for almost 2 hours, and I wondered how it would sustain the entire time. It flew. The film is a guilty pleasure.

And parents, before you take your kids to see this, then complain it was disgusting, please read the R Rating! Sit back, relax and watch, but not with coke in your mouth. It will get spit everywhere.

I'm sure plenty of parochial critics will berate this film for anti-American values during the current "war on terror"....BUT...the great thing about this film is that no one is spared being mocked. This bears the standard of a great film by expressing the ironies innate in every argument in this quasi-political tale; from socialist Michael Moore, fashionably charitable celebrities to the terrorists and the, ahem "world police." This couldn't be more accurately summed up than in one of the funniest ever analogies that is employed in this film; the "Dic*s, P*ssies, and a*s*holes, argument." This film also wonderfully parodies the standard conventions and cliché's of the action film genre to create an entertaining, and gleefully controversial film.

A guilty pleasure for sure. The humor is brazenly sophomoric, but this film gets away with it. Seeing marionettes performing the outrageous events in this chaos evoked some of the loudest laughs I've enjoyed in quite some time.

Terrorists, led by Korean dictator Kim Jong Il (sounding a lot like Elmer Fudd with a head cold) who has a routine aspiration to take over the world, are up against the Team America World Police. Peace activists from Hollywood also find their way into this film's psychotic universe. The socio-political mockeries are rampant everywhere, and no one is safe from this movie's vigilante response. Characters are impaled, decapitated, shot up, burned up, drowned, blown to bits etc.

The deliberately hokey puppetry work is priceless. Wires are clearly visible, (but cleverly not visible when the focus joke of a scene would be upstaged by their appearance), and the awkward, jerky movements while walking or dancing are integrated well. Puppets seen bouncing around in vehicles, or sitting stiffly in their chairs make the effect obvious too. My personal favorite action scene is the aerial dogfight while the Team America freedom fighters are discussing their soap opera love entanglements while they blast enemy planes in cheesy special effects explosions.

No mention of this film would be complete without acknowledging the brilliant love ballad, "Pearl Harbor Sucks, and I Miss You." This gag was absolute genius (and I couldn't agree with the sentiment more). Some of the other music score was clever too, fitting the general tone and style of the movie's humor.

There's a lot of language and intimate scenes not appropriate for all audiences. There seems to be a trend lately to show somebody puking, too, and the movie has a grossly protracted scene of this which seems like the film makers felt obligated to include it. Some of the in-your-face gross-out humor is overdone, but the movie is still overall a laugh riot.

Recommended for most audiences, if gross-out humor doesn't bother you.