All Frank the sausage wanted to do was get his meat inside Brenda the hot dog bun. What more could a sausage want? Little did he know what fate truly awaits a hot dog. The idea behind “Sausage Party” is a simple and innocent one: What if all of the food we buy has thoughts and feelings? According to Seth Rogen, the writers “very quickly realized that it would be fucked up,” and it certainly was. This adult cartoon is far from a tour de force, aspiring to no great emotional or intellectual heights. Despite this, “Sausage Party” is a thoroughly enjoyable comedy saturated with cringy and lowbrow humor, adding to Seth Rogen’s track record of raunchy and ludicrous comedy.

The film opens with a grocery store full of food performing a Disney-esque musical number about the promise and joy of being chosen by the gods, aka human consumers, and being taken out of the store into the “Great Beyond.” But after a jar of honey mustard is returned to the store, his ravings about the horrors of the gods and the Great Beyond plant a seed of doubt in the mind of Frank the sausage. After being separated from the rest of his sausage friends in a freak shopping cart accident, Frank, along with his hot dog bun girlfriend Brenda, Sammy Bagel and Kareem Abdul Lavash, goes on a quest to return to his aisle while trying to uncover the truth behind the honey mustard’s warning.

“Sausage Party” is an animated adventure with many standout, racially stereotyped characters. Firewater, a non-perishable bottle of moonshine, mirrors a wise Native American chief who guides Frank during his quest. There is a also Mr. Grits, a box of instant grits who resents crackers. From the opening musical act, in which the German Sauerkraut sing about wanting to kill the juice, “Sausage Party” had its fair share of racial jokes. Sammy Bagel and Kareem Abdul Lavash argue about having to share shelf-space, parodying the Israel-Palestine conflict. While the film may seem insensitive at times, it is difficult to make the case that the film is offensive. The first scene shows how food is separated by aisles, each with its own beliefs and conflicts. The racial jokes aren’t just funny, they remind us how absurd racial stereotypes are. “Sausage Party” makes fun of skin-deep differences in immature and terribly outdated ways, making for a clever and pretty hilarious comedy.

At the heart of “Sausage Party” is the idea that truth is subjective. As we know, there is no heaven-like Great Beyond that awaits our food. Its fate is undeniably horrifying. The sentient food uses stories about the gods to cope with the unknown and unknowable rather than accept the reality that the gods are food-eating monsters. The idea of “Sausage Party” is comically ironic because while we know the reality of food’s existence, the food is oblivious. One step removed, humans are just grocery store items waiting in the aisles of earth awaiting the Great Beyond, merely guessing the purpose of our own reality.

Seth Rogen’s stylistic fingerprints are evident all over “Sausage Party.” The film is raunchy, comically violent and has no filter for its overabundance of profanity. It even includes a cameo by none other than boho stoner James Franco, a long-time collaborator with Rogen. “Sausage Party” is a fun 90-minute showcase of Seth Rogen’s over-the-top humor filled with a plethora of unique characters. Unfortunately, the film doesn’t do enough to make you regret the next time you go to the grocery store.

Rating: B-
Director: Conrad Vernon, Greg Tiernan
Starring: Seth Rogen, James Franco, Kristen Wiig, Jonah Hill, Michael Cera, Salma Hayek, Edward Norton
Rated: R
Release Date: August 11, 2016

Image Courtesy of AceShowBiz