SAUSAGE PARTY – Rated R

SAUSAGE PARTY – Rated R

Starring the voices of Seth Rogen, James Franco, Jonah Hill, Kristen Wiig, Selma Hayak, Bill Hader, Edward Norton and Paul Ruud

Written, directed and/or produced by some of the same dudes who brought us such comedic gems as SUPER BAD, PINEAPPLE EXPRESS, and THE NIGHT BEFORE, comes an animated film that is not only food based, but takes it’s blows at almost every religion, race or social stereotype in our society ~ This is SAUSAGE PARTY!!

Living out his days on a grocery store shelf, hoping to some day be chosen to venture outside to “the great beyond”, we meet Frank (voiced by Seth Rogen), a hotdog hoping to be united with his girlfriend ~ and shelf buddy ~ the voluptuous Bun Brenda (voiced by Kristen Wiig).

As Frank and Brenda long for the holiday that brings wieners and buns together (yes, that kind of innuendo) each and every year, their fellow foods go about their merry way too, hoping to be chosen to become a part of the big celebration…

When a jar of honey mustard is chosen, but then returned, he starts a panic of epic proportions when he reveals that the “the life beyond their respective shelves” isn’t all its cracked up to be.

When Frank, Brenda, and a few of the other food items hanging out in the store decide to venture across the store to find the isle containing Firewater (Bill Hader) – as he is the most knowledgeable product in the store, they find that what he knows may be just as, if not scarier, than what the honey mustard was spewing, before his demise…

I give SAUSAGE PARTY a rating of DON’T WASTE YOUR TIME OR MONEY ~ Yep, you saw that right…even though I love lots of the guys involved in this little R-Rated, animated FOOD FEST, once I got past about the first 15 minutes of this demented animated booty call – SAUSAGE PARTY just became a big ol mess of a film for me. Let’s face it, I’m not a prude or one of those politically correct chicks at every turn either, and the premise of the film sounded funny and amusing going in, but between the “stereotypical typecasting of it’s characters” to the all-out food orgy that ensues at the end, the disturbing offensive nature of this film was even more than I cared to absorb, as I had to sit through it to the bitter end. I’m thinking that Rogen, Hill and Goldberg, who penned this rather offensive take on the world of perishable and non-perishables foods items alike ~ need to stop smoking the mighty weed so much to get their creative juices flowing ~ as this film went way over the edge in it’s quest for comedy and dude humor, and ended up just coming across as a film about food products that had absolutely no taste, when it was all said and done. You may laugh at parts, as it’s funny a few times throughout, and you may enjoy all the sexual innuendos throughout its 89 minutes too, as at first they seem harmless and remotely appetizing, but, as this film goes deeper into it’s storyline of inappropriateness, I just wanted it, and it’s distasteful rhetoric to be over… long before it was through.

Kathy Kaiser