Word has it that the movie critic Roger Ebert at first gave this movie a sound stomping but then reconsidered his review and changed it to positive after acknowledging the words of many irate fans who felt he didn't "get it." Perhaps good old Ebert should've stuck to his guns. While not a terrible movie in the least, it's just not that funny. South Park isn't all that awesome of a cartoon series to begin with, but what works within the short space of a cartoon episode nearly fizzles within the stretch of a feature length movie.

By now everybody should be aware of the legacy of South Park, that silly little cartoon which seeks to offend every major group and rip apart every moral idea ever made. That legacy lives on in the movie. It's simply more of the same. What other movie or cartoon series do you know would do something so bold like suggest that Ghandi is living in hell right alongside Hitler? However I'm not here to gripe about the crass nature of the movie or even the purposefully terrible animation of fake paper cutouts. It's simply not all that funny. I think it's just too in love with its own fart jokes, as can be witnessed towards the end when one of the Canadian brothers goes "Hey guess what? I just farted." and you can almost hear the movie trying to insert "badaam ching". I realize this movie was trying to make a point about censorship and being too zealous in trying to legislate morality, but enough is enough.

The movie also rips into people's love affair with Broadway style musical numbers, but even when its parodying big song-and-dance extravaganzas it comes off like a joke itself with songs so stretched out, cheesy, and terrible they make me want to run for cover within the relative safety of the show tunes from The Little Mermaid. Maybe the songs are sung in a cheesy way on purpose, but I really can't tell when I'm covering up my ears.

What saves this movie is the thought that it least tries to be bold when few other animated movies dare to be at least above pandering to kids. That and the sequence where Cartman saves the day by tossing out lightning bolts thanks to V Chip plugged in his head, which I must admit is a wonderfully animated sequence even within the confines of the purposefully terrible animation. I'll also admit that the song "Kyle's Mom Is A (censored)" had me rolling in stitches. I won't go so far to say that this was a terrible movie. So I give it a fair 2.5.

I'll admit to being a big fan of South Park. Even after so many seasons, its best episodes are nearly as good as its iconoclastic early ones. However, I could have predicted (probably did predict, in fact) that it would be a disappointment as a feature. The writers clearly struggle to maintain the crackling pace of the best TV episodes sustained over 90 mins, and personally I ran out of concentration well before the thing was over.

Quite simply, its ideal format is as a half hour satirical sitcom, not a feature movie. As with most of the Star Trek movies, South Park just starts to get ragged when you stretch it out into a format twice its ideal length.

There are plenty of classic moments of course, but I found it a bit like watching an early Woody Allen film. You have to sit through a lot of stuff that doesn't really work, to catch the moments of greatness when it does.

The songs are definately a strong point. 'Blame Canada' is rightfully considered a classic, though I must admit the thing which made me laugh the most in the whole movie was 'Kyle's Mom is a big fat b...." No, it's neither clever nor mature - the timing is just so damn funny. I was rather disappointed when I realized that it was a reprise of a song already used in a TV episode I'd missed.

I think any review of the animation is rather pointless. I have wondered though, whether animators on South Park sometimes have to re-do stuff because they accidentally made it look professional.

It's alright, but the storyline doesn't have the relevance, durability or clout of the better TV episodes., and the gaps between the truly funny gags just seem a bit wider than you're used to.

Still an OK movie, though I think once was enough for me.

The swearing, occasional graphic violence and sexual references may put many people off this movie.

But the movie doesn't care. :)

The South Park movie is a remarkably amusing tale of the chaos which engulfs a small town when its children sneak into an R-rated movie and (gasp) learn naughty words! (As if the South Park kids didn't know enough already.) Soon the mothers of South Park are up in arms and badgering the President to wage war on Canada. Unknown to them, they are the pawns of a world takeover by Satan and his gay lover, Saddam Hussein.

The film relies on the same shock humor (some of it, frankly, over the top) and contradictions of modern society ("Remember, horrific, mind-numbing violence is okay, as long as there are no dirty words!") as the television show, as the mothers go to the lengths of implanting v-chips in their kids' heads, executing actors, and waging war in order to protect their kids from potty-mouthed movies.

The animation is the usual South Park paper cut-outs...there's even a bit of a side joke in the film about it, when Cartman expresses disinterest in seeing the Terrence and Philip movie because "the animation is all crappy." There are also some cool CGI scenes in Hell, following the usual death of Kenny.

But what lifts this film above being just an extra-long, extra-foulmouthed version of the TV show is the surprising presence of some really fun and well-written songs, often accompanying musical-style dance productions, and mostly parodic in nature. 'Blame Canada,' the showpiece song of the film, has all the mothers melodramatically proclaiming how Canada has corrupted their children with their films. ("Don't blame me for my son Stan, he saw the darn cartoon and now he's off to join the Klan!") "I wanna be up there" is a wistful, dreamy, longing song worthy of any misunderstood Disney hero...except that it's sung by Satan. There is a wonderful scene where Mr. Mackey sings the kids a song--"It's Easy, M'Kay?" urging them not to swear. In fact, there's not a dull song in the film.

If humor in bad taste doesn't appeal to you, avoid this film like the plague. Others will find it good for quite a lot of laughs.

The soundtrack CD is also worth looking into...unfortunately, the movie songs weren't enough to fill the CD, and a lot of other stuff by various artists was added, much of it not worth hearing. (Also, strangely missing is the song 'Little Boy You're Going to Hell' from Kenny's death scene.)