mmhkay....

Rating: 8/10 (24 July 2002)

Future generations will divide the world into people who love South Park and those who hate it. Obviously no one who hates the TV show will like the movie. Those that like the series are in for a treat though. Parker/Stone have been given a lot more freedom here than they have on TV and it shows. The opening 20 minutes with Terrance and Phillip's movie "Asses of Fire" is hugely over the top, even for South Park standards. It's also one of the funniest things I've ever seen in a movie.
The writing is very good, and many of the incidental characters have a lot more depth than in most live action movies. This shows particularly in characters like the Canadian Ambassador (in fact every Canadian), Saddam Hussein or the mole, one of the funniest characters ever created. Although after that initial opening burst the movie seems to run out of steam a bit, it does pick up again towards the end. Like the later TV episodes it also starts getting a bit preachy in parts and tries to hammer home its point a bit obvious, although this doesn't really take over as much here. Basically it rallies against blind censorship of people who rather see laws implemented than looking after their own kids. In a predictable move, this ended up being the exact scenario when the movie was released.

The movie is actually an improvement on the TV show and meant that watching the series was for ever after a bit of a let down. There are so many great ideas hidden in this film, like Saddam & Satan, Bill Gates, making the movie a musical or the hip hop remix of Terrance & Phillip's song. Two negative points, Chef is criminally underused and this movie has to be just about the shortest feature ever released.
Kudos to Channel 9 for showing the un-edited version.