Team America: World Police - 10/20/04

Written by: Trey Parker, Matt Stone, Pam Brady

Starring: Trey Parker, Matt Stone, Kristen Miller, Masasa, Daran Norris

Official Site

I was supposed to see this film a week before it opened, but I got stuck at work, it was late, and I was exhausted.

It's a shame, because if I had gone, I would have enjoyed the film a lot more. As it is, I was very impressed with the movie, I love Parker and Stone's work, and this is just another example of their sense of humor, purpose and goal of making films that others won't make... and succeeding where others would fail.

Orgazmo, Cannibal the Musical, BASEketball and, of course, South Park... these guys have done some incredible work over the last eight years. And if you keep in mind all of the work they do in each project... the script, the producing, editing and writing the lyrics to most of the songs in their films... the two really have strong creative control over their projects.

But this film has got to be the largest, most complex film they've created. I mean, sure, the first film was probably hard... the second film was with a larger budget and took time and energy... but this films production was so intense and detailed that it must have weighed on the creators something serious.

With a prospective budget of $30 million, Parker and Stone created a pretty impressive story, taking pot shots at pretty much everyone... especially the pacifist Hollywood types (Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, Helen Hunt, etc), Michael Moore and Jerry Bruckheimer... which the two have stated they have a newfound respect for, after their experiences trying to create an action film.

But Parker and Stone aren't the only people who need to be congratulated. First off, the puppet makers themselves, the Chiodo brothers. The two have worked on creature effects for some films in the past... but nothing like this. With their team, they helped create some incredible puppets, their animatronics helping to make the scenes much more complex and entertaining than, say, regular puppets.

Paul M. Sonski, Fontaine Beauchamp Hebb and Richard Walker did an incredible job with the set decorating and design. Simply incredible.

This is a group of people who have a very strong chance of winning an Academy Award this year.

The most impressive person, in my opinion, of the entire crew is Bill Pope. Pope is a God behind the camera. His cinematography has graced a large number of mega hits in the past five years, including the entire Matrix series, Spider-Man 2, Wild Wild West and more. His first DP work was with Sam Raimi on Darkman... and he would continue to work with Raimi on Army of Darkness and, of course, Spider-Man 2.

He would work with the Wachowski Brothers on their first feature Bound, in 1996... and then with them on The Matrix trilogy.

Fire in the Sky, Clueless, Zero Effect and Bedazzled round out the rest of his resume.

Now, when thinking of cinematography, you have to consider that DP's light the set, they deal with special effects, green screens, props, etc... all of which can and will affect the photography.

Now, think about how a DP has to solve all of these problems on a much smaller scale... with a completely different lighting system, smaller sets and, for God sake, puppets!

Parker, Stone and Pope had mentioned how difficult the entire process was... where they would sit there and watch the monitors, waiting for the right movements of the puppets... for example, taking a sip of scotch. The creators, directors and crew would have to wait hours for just the right movement, inflection and feel.

All in all, it must have made for a frustrating shoot... but 100% successful.

In my opinion, this is the kind of film George Lucas wishes he could make again. He's gotten to a point where everything is green screen, CGI and bad acting that gets pushed into the background by fantastic effects. This film reminded me of the first (second and third) Star Wars film. So much time and effort was put into Team America... and it all shows on the screen. You don't see this type of work, with films having smaller budgets and for designers, art directors and their crews having to improvise sets, or use their imaginations to get things looking right, or at least better...

All in all, this was a very impressive feature. It's a shame that Parker and Stone had to forfeit not only their front end but their back end as well... because the studios didn't have any faith in the film, or its creators. I hope, in the future, that Parker and Stone get more respect and flexibility to create their films, and reap the profits.

As a side note... you should try and find the letter that Sean Penn wrote to Parker and Stone, about their movie... it's pretty funny because afte the film opened, Parker wrote a letter answering that letter (which was basically a FU letter), saying that if it wasn't for Sean Penn's letter being published here and there, all the publicity it made, the movie might not have made as much money... too funny.