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Team America World Police
Trey Parker and Matt Stone first came on the scene and shocked the politically correct masses with their low budget animated series South Park. Many viewers never looked past the bleeped out cursing, and all the other most definitely not politically correct situations to see the brilliance and intelligence of the series. Apparently though, many viewers did, because the show is still running, something that continues to surprise its creators.
Parker and Stone have an unflinching eye on pop culture and current affairs like no other filmmakers out there. South Park is more current than any other television series, often covering topics while they are still happening. Team America is no different as it takes a look at current global politics, while also spoofing the big budget no-brainer action movies that are plaguing our summers. This time their medium of choice is that of puppets spoofing the sixties era Thunderbirds television series.
Team America is an elite counter terrorist police force charged with going around the world and stopping terrorists no matter what country they are in. In fact each country they go to is defined by how far it is from America. The team is made up of a martial arts expert, an all American football player, a clairvoyant, and the sexy female lead.
Team America busts up a terrorist operation in France at the beginning of the film. They kill the terrorists, many civilians, and they manage to destroy the Eiffel Tower and the Lourve in the process. The team isn't phased by the mass destruction they've just caused. One of the team members gets blasted by a terrorist just as he is proposing to our sexy lead. These first scenes set the tone for the film, not only are we gonna get some hilarious political satire, but we are gonna get some really funny action movie spoofing as well.
The teams super computer called I.N.T.E.L.L.I.G.E.N.C.E. informs them that they must stop a new threat. But they fail and the world turns against them. When the leader of the team scolds the computer by saying bad intelligence, I lost it.
As it turns out a North Korean dictator is the mastermind of a global terrorist attack along with his unwitting partner F.A.G. (Film Actors Guild) led by Alec Baldwin, Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, and Susan Sarandon. Other featured actors include Danny Glover, George Clooney, Matt Damon, and Janeane Garofalo. These actors preach passivism throughout the film until they themselves take up arms to defend the dictator. Penn speaks on a newscast about how wonderful a place the Middle East was before Team America came stomping through.
The film is brash, it features strong language, low brow humor, it plays on some stereotypes, and it even features a surprisingly explicit puppet sex scene. But at its core Team America is an intelligent thought provoking social and political commentary. It says that each side is flawed and that our country couldn't exist without both sides, and at least in their opinion, the answers are somewhere in the middle. It also begs the question "Why do these movie stars think they are so much smarter and well informed than the rest of us? Why does Sean Penn think that he knows so much he should be on CNN telling us what to think and do?" Celebrities are trying to get the rest of us to follow like sheep rather than get educated about our world and make our own decisions.
Penn and his type put a lot of pressure on fellow actors and filmmakers to follow them or be silent. What I love about Parker and Stone is they don't succumb to that pressure, they express themselves regardless of what anyone thinks. Now because of our current climate you may be thinking I'm saying they are conservative. Just like when critics say that Michael Moore is a shoddy documentary filmmaker the common response is "oh well those critics are conservative". That's not the case, just look at this movie, these guys are anything but conservative, they just aren't liberal to a fault. Like the message of the film, I think they fall somewhere in between.
There's Star Wars and The Matrix gags as well as some of the cheesiest funniest Michael Bay style dialogue ever put into a film through Team America. The pacing is fast, the social and political commentary is sharp and witty, and the score is fantastic. This may be one of the smartest funniest films I've seen this year, and it stars puppets! Speaking on the score, the songs are catchy and hysterical. My favorite absolutely has to be America, F*!k Yeah! The song feels like it came streight out of a commercial for GI Joe action figures, or from an 80's actioner like The Delta Force. Also "Pearl Harbor sucks, and I miss you" is a really great tune ripping on the Pearl Harbor film.
This may be the only film I see this summer that gets a perfect score.
10/10
-Stephen Lackey |
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Team America World Police
Review: 10/10
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