| Posted by: jeo4 at October 18, 2004, 3:37 pm | | Topic: Reviews: Team America: World Police Forum: JoBlo | | I had the opportunity to see TEAM AMERICA: WORLD POLICE this weekend. In a year where campaign rhetoric and hostilities between political parties are both annoyingly high, this film is a breath of fresh air. The story is one that never takes itself too seriously and everyone in the world today is fair game. The story revolves around the team of anti-terrorism specialists, who combat anyone with malicious intent and a penchant for WMD's. That means that Kim Jong Il and just about everyone in the Middle-East are targets, along with several innocent bystanders. Jetting off to exotic locations around the world (and in many cases leveling them), Team America kicks dust in the face of terrorist bullies while knocking several monuments to the ground. When all is said and done, Paris and is down for the count. But at least the bad guys are dead! Jetting off to their headquarters inside the Washington head at Mount Rushmore, Team America has to regroup and prepare for a covert mission, where new guy Gary has to act like a terrorist and worm his way into a cafe' in Cairo. The scenes are both stereotypical and spoof fodder. The cafe' band, for example, plays like the cantina band from STAR WARS, while the terrorists use words like Mohammed and jihad in their everyday vocabulary. And as usual, there is a chase scene ("Quick! They're headed west down Baka-daka-laka Street!") where the team has to rescue Gary from his terrorist "captors". In the end, Cairo suffers much the same fate as Paris, with several landmarks, shops and vehicles trashed. As in Paris, the locals can only stare in disbelief at the ruin of their home. Ultimately, Gary has to decide whether to accept his new destiny as a member of the team or return to his home on Broadway and continue to build his acting career. All the while, Kim Jong Il is preparing for a full terror attack on the world while fending off the likes of Hans Blix from searching his palace. ("Hans Brix?! God d*mn it!") As with Trey Parker and Matt Stone's SOUTH PARK: BIGGER, LONGER AND UNCUT, the film is peppered with swearing, celebrities, and musical numbers. And in some cases, the songs were themselves loaded with cussing, such as the Team America themesong, America (F*ck Yeah!). Then of course, the film has loads of violence, gory deaths, and (you guessed it) gratuitous puppet sex. The sex scenes were trimmed down to accomodate the MPAA and garner the film an R rating instead of an NC-17, though this film has a little something for everyone in the offensive department. The exploding heads and bleeding puppets were also a wild surprise. Acting in a puppet film is a little different than in animated features, as the marionettes make up half the character being delivered to audiences. I tip my hat to the set designers as well as Parker and Stone for making some rather textured moments for puppets, not to mention the team of puppeteers who made the scenes as memorable as I've ever seen. The puppet sex scene will live in infamy, as will the exploding heads and bleeding bodies. Voice work and physical scenes were as good as they could be, even when the dialogue wasn't great and the story dragged. The celeb members of the Film Actors Guild (F.A.G.) were hilarious charicatures that made the movie even more of a treat. My one bitch about this film is that the dialogue didn't always work, and as a result neither did the gags associated with it. On some occassions, things seemed forced and awkward. The acting wasn't perfect, but what do I expect with puppets? Many critics have tagged this the funniest film of the year. I wouldn't go that far. However, I remember what I saw over the weekend, and two days later, I'm still laughing at most of it. Spoofs aren't meant to be taken seriously. And this film was really slamming everyone in even measure. So it did its job on most levels. It was definitely the break from reality I needed. 7/10 |
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