Crude, rude and with plenty of non PC laughs.

Rating: 7/10 (31 October 2004)

A set of small town preteens get their "tiny minds" corrupted by an unsuitable movie and trigger a series of silly events that lead to war - and perhaps even apocalypse!
Told by means of cheap cardboard cut-out animation with only one or two pieces of CGI.
There is no way anybody can summit a comedy as silly and out-there as this. You could talk about this Trey Parker film from now until Christmas, but until you have seen it you won't understand the concept or how it all hangs together - or sometimes doesn't.
The difference between the (same name) TV series and this film is that they take the joke further (and given that the TV series involved a talking turd - Mr Hanky - that is saying something!) and use more foul language and sexual images. This film takes the view that children using four letter words is funny - a concept only possible in a cartoon.
While I haven't read all the reviews most seem to take the view that it is OK to use images of children in this way or at least not to question it. I am not so sure. The crude nature of the cartoon helps of course. If this was done in the manner of the best of Disney animation - although the costs would be astronomical! - then we would hear more about it.
The No.1 rule of silly comedy being that there is no No.1 rule. You can go anywhere - even Hell! - and do anything. The targets are Canadians, dopey school teachers, overprotective parents, homeless people, world leaders and the off-beat folks that hang around in a "redneck little town."
For reasons that maybe have something to do with the time it was being made Saddam Hussian is taken as dead - presuming that American's thought he soon would be? - and forms a homosexual relationship with the devil. Who he runs rings around. They make a highly comic couple.
(The film was banned in Iraq when it came out - they even issued a statement as funny as anything on the screen! Is it now unbanned?)
The really interesting part of this movie is that is uses mock old time show tunes to tell the story. The juxtaposition of this style of music being used in such a crude environment works for easy laughs - although only the unbelievable Uncle F***** song stays with you afterwards. I laugh just thinking about it.
(Canadians Terrence and Philips might be the funniest cartoon characters of all time. Despite being the cause of all the trouble we don't see enough of them.)
Yes there is a bit of a South Park's Greatest Hits about the thing and famous faces crop up to have the mickey taken out of them. The part with Wyonna Ryder at the war rally was the funniest thing I have seen in years. A real jaw dropper.
The only thing is that it goes on too long for what it is. The laughs tend to slow down as the film draws to its silly end-of-days conclusion. It doesn't hold together as drama, but a series of scenes that are either funny or not funny. The George Clooney hospital part (voiced by the man himself) is one of the flops.
Let us hope they now know the joke is over and we don't have a South Park II.