"Sausage Party" has a fantastic premise: Food items in the grocery store are excited to be purchased by humans who they believe to be gods. When they are chosen, they believe they go to food paradise and enjoy heaven but when they realize the truth, all hell breaks loose.
The premise alone is enough to watch the film with great anticipation. It's an adult-humor animated comedy not afraid to go all the way while also providing fascinating perspective commentary on society, politics, and religion. The film ultimately does say what it wants to say but by the end, I found myself spiting the film for how it said it.
First of all, the humor. This film has garnered a reputation for being a hard 'R' film for it's strong crude and sexual content and language. As the film progressed, I noticed that the language was so frequent that the humorous shock value had disappeared by the middle of Act II. For the sake of going "all the way," it's obvious that the writers wanted to take it even further which made the film less funny. In this case, over the top was a strong asset until it became so much that I just felt sick watching it. It didn't become humorous anymore and it just became obsence and vulgar for the sake of just vulgarity. At that point, I believe the target audience has changed from intelligent adults ready for some raunchy humor to teenagers trapped in adults bodies. Not to be rude myself but the film lost its intelligence and appealed to much more basic and rudimentary tastes of entertainment.
Second, the message. Along with the humor, there is such thing as over the top and while the premise promised an intriguing critique of previously listed themes, the script's dialogue, characterization, and overall delivery became quickly heavy handed and in your face. Not long after Act I was over that I realized the message of idiocrisy of religion and religious-based beliefs and ideas were being forced down my throat in an offensive and distasteful way.
Major complaints aside, I thoroughly enjoyed the animation style. Lots of work went into the aesthetics of the film and I think the animation is, by far, the movie's greatest strength. The cast also boasts some very talented actors and actresses that make talking hot dogs believable. What humor was present and landed well, I think not only goes to some saving graces in the script but in the talented people voicing the characters. In particular, Seth Rogen and Kirsten Wig did a great job as the story's leads.
Overall, I liked the talent and animation and several jokes landed really well. However, due to the inherent flaws in the script's vision and the humor getting ridiculously over the top and just gross, I can't and will not recommend this to anyone. It's obscene just because it's bored. If you're interested in animation films for adults, I would recommend high quality works that having something to say while retaining the intelligence and goodwill that the audience should demand.
Recommendations: Fantastic Planet (1973), Perfect Blue (1997), Akira (1988), Anomalisa (2015), etc.
The premise alone is enough to watch the film with great anticipation. It's an adult-humor animated comedy not afraid to go all the way while also providing fascinating perspective commentary on society, politics, and religion. The film ultimately does say what it wants to say but by the end, I found myself spiting the film for how it said it.
First of all, the humor. This film has garnered a reputation for being a hard 'R' film for it's strong crude and sexual content and language. As the film progressed, I noticed that the language was so frequent that the humorous shock value had disappeared by the middle of Act II. For the sake of going "all the way," it's obvious that the writers wanted to take it even further which made the film less funny. In this case, over the top was a strong asset until it became so much that I just felt sick watching it. It didn't become humorous anymore and it just became obsence and vulgar for the sake of just vulgarity. At that point, I believe the target audience has changed from intelligent adults ready for some raunchy humor to teenagers trapped in adults bodies. Not to be rude myself but the film lost its intelligence and appealed to much more basic and rudimentary tastes of entertainment.
Second, the message. Along with the humor, there is such thing as over the top and while the premise promised an intriguing critique of previously listed themes, the script's dialogue, characterization, and overall delivery became quickly heavy handed and in your face. Not long after Act I was over that I realized the message of idiocrisy of religion and religious-based beliefs and ideas were being forced down my throat in an offensive and distasteful way.
Major complaints aside, I thoroughly enjoyed the animation style. Lots of work went into the aesthetics of the film and I think the animation is, by far, the movie's greatest strength. The cast also boasts some very talented actors and actresses that make talking hot dogs believable. What humor was present and landed well, I think not only goes to some saving graces in the script but in the talented people voicing the characters. In particular, Seth Rogen and Kirsten Wig did a great job as the story's leads.
Overall, I liked the talent and animation and several jokes landed really well. However, due to the inherent flaws in the script's vision and the humor getting ridiculously over the top and just gross, I can't and will not recommend this to anyone. It's obscene just because it's bored. If you're interested in animation films for adults, I would recommend high quality works that having something to say while retaining the intelligence and goodwill that the audience should demand.
Recommendations: Fantastic Planet (1973), Perfect Blue (1997), Akira (1988), Anomalisa (2015), etc.