South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut

Rating:
Summary: Music, Satan, Sadaam, and Cartman, what more could you want
Review: It was a little tough figuring out how to rate this. I waited to buy the movie until I had a DVD player and could get the DVD. But for what? There are no extras on the DVD, not even a director's commentary (which seems to be on every DVD available). No fireside chats, no extra footage, no discussion of their time with the MPAA. Nothing. Even Showtime has more extras when they show the movie than the DVD. Now I have to wonder why I waited and just didn't buy it on VHS. They really dropped the ball here.

But in the end I have to give the movie the highest rating possible because of the quality of the movie. South Park might just be the most cutting edge tv series ever made. The movie does fall a bit short of the series, but it is still one of the funniest movies made. It satirizes and parodies more things than I can begin to mention. And is a musical, no less (the songs they came up with are worth the price of the movie alone).

It's a great movie, I just wish they had done more with the DVD.

Rating:
Summary: Bust a Gut!
Review: What Cheech and Chong are to the stoner comedy, South Park is to the tripper comedy. With bizarre juxtipositions of ideas, to insanely silly musical numbers, to just plain dumb jokes, with a self-awareness of how dumb they are, it's clear that these guys have eaten a bit of paper in their time. I don't think any comedy has ever been so inspired from beginning to end. It's too bad the show hasn't maintained the same high level.

Rating:
Summary: One of my Top Ten of 1999
Review: How on Earth can I explain to you why I liked South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut so much? There are several reasons. For one thing, it is an honest product. Not fettered by the confines they endure on the television series, the kids of South Park are free to utter unbleeped every naughty four-letter word they say but don't say on TV. And writer-director Trey Parker is free to unleash his singular brand of insanity on those who wish to see it.

Then there is the matter of not what you say, but how you say it. Or in this case, not what you draw, but how you draw it. The South Park world is drawn in such a childlike, primary colors way that it exists in its own space. In this way, Parker and his crew can get away with sketches and satires that should be truly offensive, except for the fact that you would have to have no sense of humor at all to take them seriously. These kids are and are not our children. Their parents are and are not us. It all has an Alice in Wonderland feel to it.

Finally, there is the art of the joke. When most of us tell an off-color joke, we end up sounding cruder than the joke itself. We are an embarrassment. Then there are the few among us who can tell such a joke in a way that makes the rest of us laugh despite all our efforts to remain reserved and above the fray. This is what I found happening to me in South Park. A small part of me was reminding myself that Mom and Dad raised me right. The rest of me was rolling on the floor laughing. Much the same thing happened in 1998 with There's Something About Mary, which is the only other movie I can begin to compare this one with.

So what is the movie about? Cartman and his buddies go to see a movie starring their favorite actors, who are Canadian. The actors gross out the rest of the audience members, who walk out. The South Park kids, however, enjoy every single minute and leave the theater talking just like their four-letter word heroes. Soon, they are in so much trouble that Cartman has a V-chip inserted in his brain. He gets an electric shock whenever he says a forbidden word. Things escalate, and America blames Canada for all the profanity our kids are using. War is declared. And, to top it off, South Park is also a good musical. The songs are well written, well performed and totally demented.

South Park is not for children. though they may be attracted to these cute little cartoon kids. It is not for many adults, who are repelled by these same characters. No, South Park is primarily for devotees of the TV series, who know what to expect going in. It is also for those who, like myself, go in totally unprepared and wind up enjoying what is, in a way, a whole other reality.

Rating:
Summary: Stretching the limits of censorship, brilliantly
Review: The fun guys who put this together fully intended to see how much they could get away with. As the story goes, even the title (after others were rejected) slipped by the censors. Once the censors got it, it was too late to change it, so score one for the good guys.

I'm pretty liberal with letting my kids view movies. This one I keep away from them. It's loaded with possibly more profanity per minute than I've ever seen in a movie. But you know what? When I saw the movie, I hadn't laughed as loud in a long time, and I'm embarrassed to say it was at all the childish parts. Embarrassed, but extremely pleased I saw it.

But I would not give the movie five stars if it was just a lot of potty humor. Well, maybe I would. But this one has a lot more. For one thing, it's a musical, with original, funny, full-length songs (take note "Moulin Rouge"). And they're songs that tie in with the plot of the movie, not just ones where the plot stops so someone can sing a song. Not that you'll ever hear most of them on any airwaves.

And, agree with it or not, the social satire is excellent. The major theme, of course, is censorship itself. But we get to see excellent shots taken at Sadaam Hussien. We also see Satan as a somewhat sympathetic character, as we hear a song from his point of view. While they also poke fun at the true odds of anyone actually making it to heaven, you'll be surprised at how heart-wrenching Kenny's final act of heroism is at the end of the movie.

Great film. Too bad I have to find time to watch it when the kids are away.

Rating:
Summary: Brilliantly hilarious
Review: I remember when the show first started off on Comedy Central and I thought it was the funniest show I have ever seen. When the movie came out I saw it in theaters and hearing the things I heard the characters say in the movie I was rolling around the floor laughing like an idiot. Its up to Stan, Kyle, Cartman, and Kenny to save the world from Satan and his lover Saddam Hussein (yes you read that right). What results is so laugh out loud hilarious you'll be begging for more after its over. A special note, at the scene where Kenny is going to heaven, then gets denied and goes to hell, that is Metallica frontman James Hetfield singing the "Little Boy Your Going to Hell" song in the background. I strongly recommend this to anyone who has a good sense of humor and loves the First Amendment.

Rating:
Summary: A Riot
Review: If you like the TV series, you'll like this. Upon seeing a movie by Canadian comics Terrance and Phillip, the gang of four, Cartman, Stan, Kyle and Kenny, vastly increase the scope of their profanity. Kenny dies trying to copy a stunt from the movie -- lighting a fart -- and the story follows him to hell. There is the usual co-dependent relationship between Satan and Saddam Hussein. Will Satan never learn? The gang of four (now three) lead the way to more and more twisted profanity on the part of almost all the children of South Park. This naturally leads to war with Canada and potentially the end of the world. Where it all ends .... Well, watch the movie.

Rating:
Summary: Mindless entertainment this is not...
Review: On the box for this movie are blurbs from (among others) Time Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times. Is something wrong here?

Absolutely not. _South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut_ has to be ranked as one of the best animated feature length films ever made. Never before has a seeming "cartoon" displayed such a dynamic combination of biting satire, trenchant social commentary and anti-censorship headiness in one 80 minute package. There is much politically incorrect humor here to be sure, and a truckload of scatologically driven jokes whose punchlines are more oft than not functions of the human body. However this amazingly does not matter at all, the entire film packing a comedic jolt closely alongside the wallop of its intellectual points; and no one can say for sure which is truly the stronger.

Many people have complained that this is mindless entertainment, that it is a worthless, corrupting, troublesome blip-- and it is these people who have not gotten the joke, indeed, are the joke's target. _South Park_ is only ever supposed to be fun, but its fun is connected with the so-latent-as-to-be-invisible philosophy behind the images in a deadly important way. I cannot think of a casual Sunday Afternoon matinee I'd rather see more successful than this brash, over the top laughfest, where charm and mean-spiritedness clash and conglomerate into an artistically fruitful vaudevillian juggernaut.

Originally titled _Hell Breaks Loose_-- a fitting one which the writing duo of Trey Parker and Matt Stone couldn't get past the MPAA-- the film is one whose theme of artistic freedom refusing to be shackled by standards of taste or convention is as close to something as humanitarian and timeless as any Disney picture. Indeed, the film functions directly as musical, operating both as reference point of and departure from not only early Hollywood movies but also contemporary children's cinema. No surprise then that the film's music has won respected awards. This from a duo of creators who say they made the film cruder, meaner, and nastier with each cut they sent the ever-rejecting MPAA. It is not hard to imagine; though it is surprising that they were able to sneak the alternate title by into the final print before the Association realized what it had approved. In fact, this may as well apply to the film itself, which according to the Internet Movie Database contains over 700 obscene profanities, vulgarities, and gestures. Amazing.

This work is what it is: a skewering of those who not only can't take a joke, but also those who won't let you, either. Highly recommended to open-minded, art-for-arts-sake aesthetes as well as those who want a good, raucous, hearty laugh-- even if it is not at all a clean one.

Rating:
Summary: my son's reaction
Review: Alright...South Park is not my cup of tea. However, I bought this DVD for my 25 year old son at xmas along with a new DVD player. He also has this movie on VHS. After talking to him about the DVD...he told me he and his roommate watched it 4 times the first day he had his DVD player hooked up. I guess this means it's a hit!? I have another son who was rather upset that he didn't receive the South Park movie also. So I'll be ordering again.

Rating:
Summary: What else?
Review: What are the guys who did that magnificient cartoon show doing nowadays?? southpark still on air or just in DVDs?? Do americans like that show?
I really wanna watch that cartoon n wanna know whats the end of it?

Rating:
Summary: Very Funny!
Review: I am a big fan of the South Park TV show, so naturally I would enjoy this. I especially liked the musical scores, such as: "Uncle F---a" and "What Would Brian Boitano Do?". This film's plot is: Stan, Kyle, Kenny, and Cartman sneak into an R-Rated movie. When they start to swear in class, Mr. Mackey calls their parents. Later, the parents find out it was a Canadian film and declare war on Canada. I would reccomend this movie to any fan of the South Park series or any other of Matt and Trey's movies.