A Clever Successor To Monty Python And The Holy Grail, Cannibal! The Musical Entertains!

The Good: Surprisingly funny, Well-written, Entertaining, Decent plot progression, Good initial characterizations/performances.
The Bad: Mediocre acting, Characters are “types,” Homophobic jokes/milks the same jokes to death.
The Basics: Cannibal! The Musical is a quirky little comedy film that is surprisingly good and vastly underrated in geek culture.


It is a rare thing for me when my wife recommends a movie I have not even heard of. On the few occasions that has happened, it surprises me less when the movie is an obscure, indie comedy film that has almost no presence on video. What surprises me more about learning of these weird little films that my wife witnessed in her young adulthood, is when I see them (which I inevitably do) and actually enjoy them (which so seldom occurs that “actually” is entirely appropriate). Yet, such has happened with Cannibal! The Musical.

Cannibal! The Musical is most analogous to Monty Python And The Holy Grail (reviewed here!) and, in fact, bears such a resemblance to it in structure and humor style that it is absolutely shocking to me that it has not achieved the same level of notoriety in geek culture as the older movie. Created by Trey Parker, with some uncredited writing help from his longtime collaborator Matt Stone (the two created South Park together), the film is a one-shot musical that justifies its entirely cheey acting, inexpensive sets and mediocre direction by claiming to be a 1950’s film that was recently recovered and colorized. Regardless of one’s feelings about South Park (I’ve only had very limited experiences with it myself), Cannibal! The Musical is a riotously absurd live-action musical comedy that stands surprisingly well on its own.

As Alferd Packer awaits the resolution to his trial for cannibalism, Polly Pry visits him in jail. Despite knowing he should not speak with her without a lawyer, he begins to tell her the story of what actually happened in the woods on his journey from Utah to Breckenridge, Colorado. Unlike how the prosecutor characterizes the incident that cost five of Alferd’s associates their lives (the flashback description is gory and ridiculous as Alferd allegedly took all five men on, tearing off limbs and biting directly into their necks!), Alferd’s story is a musical adventure that begins with him getting roped into serving as a guide to a party headed from Utah to Breckenridge in search of gold.

However, after the band of men encounters a trio of punk trappers who mock them and push them around, Alferd’s beloved Arabian horse, Liane goes missing. Crossing two treacherous rivers at the expense of most of their supplies, Alferd’s team encounters Chinese “Indians,” a Cyclops, and the trappers again. Soon, one of Alferd’s men realizes that Alferd is heading south, where the trappers said they were going, following the path of his horse as opposed to guiding them to Breckinridge. As winter falls and the Rockies become impassable, their supplies run out and when Swan goes crazy singing about making snowmen, it sets the men on a course for cannibalism!

Cannibal! The Musical has surprisingly good music. The well-written and catchy songs, like “Shpadoinkle” and “Let’s Build A Snowman” are utterly ridiculous and lampoon musicals nicely. It is hard to imagine watching Cannibal! The Musical and not finding oneself singing “My heart is full like a baked potato” at least once within the week after seeing this movie.

Outside the musical comedy aspects of Cannibal! The Musical, the film is a much tougher sell and probably the reason it never exploded even within geek culture. While something like Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog resonated as a low budget success story of late, Joss Whedon did everything he could to make it look and feel professional. Trey Parker, who wrote, directed and starred in Cannibal! The Musical, seemed to embrace the low-budget nature of the project and used that as an excuse to have the performers acting stiff and amateurish. Given how few of the stars of Cannibal! The Musical have multiple acting credits (most have abundant behind-the-camera credits on the IMDB) after this film, they either did not want to pursue acting or were too convincing in their performances here.

Cannibal! The Musical flops a bit on milking some of the jokes in the film to death. In addition to some unfortunately homophobic jokes near the beginning of the film and the obligatory joke whereby Alferd Packer is called a “fudge packer,” Parker telegraphs some of his best jokes in ways that rob them of their humor. For example, the Chinese “Indians” is an initially funny gag. However, when they speak with over-the-top accents and stereotypically Chinese mannerisms, the joke treads toward the un-funny and more potentially offensive. In other words, the gag is clever when the men walk into the camp and find a bunch of “Indians” doing tai chi and asserting they must be Indians because of the tee pees around, but when they go for more blatant references than that, they beat the humor horse to death.

Beyond Alferd, the hapless guide and horse-lover, the characters are “types” more than well-rounded individuals. Like most Westerns, Cannibal! The Musical features the green cowboy, the religious nut, and the quiet loner, though the addition of the hopeless optimist seems unique to this movie. As far as Western parodies go, Cannibal! The Musical is actually more successful in its execution than the recent Casa De Mi Padre (reviewed here!), though I suppose it is more directly analogous to Blazing Saddles (reviewed here!).

On the balance, Cannibal! The Musical is an unlikely enjoyable parody film and any adult who likes screwball humor and mocking the establishments of musical theater will undoubtedly enjoy this movie.

For other musical comedies, please visit my reviews of:
South Park: Bigger, Longer, And Uncut
Hamlet 2
A Prairie Home Companion

6/10

Check out how this film stacks up against others I have reviewed by visiting my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut An Exceptionally Funny Musical, An Average Film.

The Good: Funny, very funny, Catchy musical numbers.
The Bad: Terrible animation, Light on character development
The Basics: An exceptionally funny movie, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut has a Canadian film sparking off a war between the U.S. and Canada as a result of children swearing excessively.


Until last night, the most South Park I had watched was about five minutes worth of one of the television episodes. I do not have cable and knowing that the animated comedy is supposed to derive much of its adult humor from language and political situations, I made a conscious effort to avoid the syndicated repeats that began popping up on my broadcast television statements last year when the show was played on the airwaves. But last night, my wife said, "I want to watch the South Park movie; I think you'll like it!" So, she removed the DVD box for South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut from her DVD shelf and we sat and watched it. She was right; I did enjoy the movie, but even as it made me laugh a lot, it is hard to consider it a great movie.

A musical, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut - yes, the title is a penis joke, so that pretty much tells you how the film is going to be - is a crudely animated movie which is so self-referential that the jokes are almost entirely aimed at those who hate South Park and crude humor. The movie has predictable character arcs, poorly animated nudity, possibly more swearing than Clerks and a plot that actually develops from one thing to another as the movie progresses. This is actually the first movie in a long time that I have laughed out loud almost entirely through, so I enthusiastically recommend it for anyone who is looking for a good laugh and enjoys raunchy humor with the occasional bit of political social commentary thrown in. But it is what it is and while it is hilarious, it is not a timeless or great cinematic experience.

Happy to live in the redneck town of South Park, the kids of South Park Elementary - Kyle, Stan, Cartman and Kenny - get into the R-rated animated Terrance And Phillip movie, which is a Canadian duo who swear a lot and make constant jokes about farting. Returning to school, the boys become exceptionally popular for having seen the forbidden movie and they begin swearing up a storm. This leads the guidance counselor to rehabilitate them, a process which lasts only as long as until the kids go see the movie again. This leads to Kenny getting killed by lighting his own fart on fire and being sent to Hell.

Furious about this, Kyle's mother, Sheila organizes the PTA and blames Canada for the corruption of the children in the United States. Overwhelming President Clinton, Sheila essentially declares war on Canada by using Conan O'Brien to capture Terrance & Phillip. But, from Hell, Kenny tries to send Cartman a dire message; that Satan and Saddam Hussein will come to take over the Earth if the Canadian comedic duo is killed. Stan tries to impress a girl he likes by becoming more political, Kyle tries to stand up to his mother and Cartman tries to overcome a V-chip installed in his brain as all-out war breaks out between the United States and Canada.

South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut is a relatively short collection of fart jokes, expletives and songs about corruption of minors and foul language. But, to their credit, writers Trey Parker and Matt Stone (and Pam Brady) make the songs catchy, funny and ultimately memorable. I suppose this ought not to be surprising to me as the same writers did the music for Hamlet 2 and I can still recall the tune to "Rock Me Sexy Jesus." My wife, as it turns out, has been singing me songs from South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut for months now and I just did not know the source.

What the film does surprisingly well is tell a story that was socially ahead of its time. in 1999, before the fear-mongering that led the U.S. into wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut was illustrating just how a few hot heads could set off international turmoil. When the film isn't being socially ahead of its time, it is playing with absurdist humor - Satan and Saddam Hussein are essentially gay lovers and Satan wants to talk, while Saddam just wants to have sex - and showing remarkably astute political humor. In a critique of the Bush Administration, a Barenaked Ladies song ("Fun And Games") references how the poor and black are frequently lured into the military and used as cannon fodder. In South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, Parker, Stone and Brady make the same observations with the military strategies employed against Canada.

What South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut is light on is character development. The love story involving Stan and the area good-girl seems forced and the generic love plot (which only goes so far) feels like exactly what it is. Moreover, Cartman is entirely undeveloped; the is the same crude, foul-mouthed child at the end that he was at the beginning. Even Kyle's attempts to stand up to his mother seem like forced, obvious attempts at character development in a movie that does not actually need it. Instead, most viewers would have been content to just keep the jokes coming; it's that kind of movie.

But this is also where South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut gets itself into some trouble. Amid the jokes about farts and swearing and the political messages, the movie actually goes somewhere. As such, the movie's plot actually starts with one story and turns into another. This is fine, but in tying up the plot, the movie loses some of its punch and the final act has less music, less memorable music, and even less humor. As the war progresses, the movie becomes less funny as the characters try to get themselves out of the situation and the viewer has the feeling the writers were not sure how to both wrap it up and keep it as funny as the first three-quarters.

On DVD, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut comes with only three theatrical trailers as bonus features, at least for the one-disc original version my wife has. Even so, this is not a movie where tons of bonus features would help. The movie feels complete enough without any scenes which may have been deleted and there's hardly a need for a commentary track. This is certainly funny enough to watch, even multiple times, but it's not more than it is. It's a series of poorly animated characters running around swearing and farting. But it feels good to laugh at that.

For other animated movies, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Family Guy Presents: It's A Trap!
The Lord Of The Rings (1978 animated)
Despicable Me

5.5/10

For other movie reviews, please visit my index page on the subject by clicking here!

© 2011, 2010 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.



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