Devilishly funny

Rating: 10/10 (15 July 1999)

Movies just don't get much funnier than this. It's a witty send-up of American entertainment, with 14 musical numbers in various musical formats. It's also a vicious, right-on commentary on the MPAA ratings system, on Canada, and on American patriotism.
I have always liked the show on Comedy Central, but it has been a little uneven lately. Nevertheless, this is proof that Trey Parker and Matt Stone are for real.
The TV show has often been the target of cultural worriers - the film answers back with a broadside: it features as much profanity, violence, blasphemy and deliberately offensive behavior as any film I've ever seen, and it presents it's critics as morons who found organizations like Mothers Against Canada and end up inviting the apocalypse.
The boys sneak into an R-rated Canadian movie, starring their heroes Terrence and Philip, and emerge with an obscene vocabulary that sends their parents into a tizzy. The parents then do what parents do best: engage in a fit of blaming other people. They end pointing their finger at Canada - it's about as logical a target as "the culture," "the media" or "the guns" - and start a war.
There is an absolutely hilarious sequence involving the US military operation (the general says something like, "OK, 14th squadron, you're our shield - you're at the vanguard of this operation. Where are you guys?" Every black soldier tentatively raises his hand.)
Cartman is forced to test an anti-obscenity V-chip implanted directly into his brain - the results are predictable, but pretty funny, though it's a bit of a crib from A CLOCKWORK ORANGE.
Maybe the best scenes involve Kenny, who dies and goes to hell, where Satan and Saddam Hussein are involved in a torrid romance - Saddam is a randy, insensitive lout, and Satan is the insecure, manipulated, oft-abused "female" of the pairing.
Brilliant, twisted and immensely satisfying.