Marionettes take on world

Conservatives and liberals take a licking in this film by 'South Park' creators.
By BETSY PICKLE
SCRIPPS HOWARD
Held together by -- literally -- string and crude humor, "Team America: World Police" is the perfect movie for those suffering from presidential-race rage.
Though it doesn't live up to the brilliant promise of its trailer, it's a nearly nonstop assault on politics and patriotism that cuts across party and national lines.
An equal-opportunity offender from "South Park" creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, "Team America: World Police" attacks conservatives and liberals alike using verbal sparring skills no more refined than those of a schoolyard spat.
It's supposed to be a satire, but unfortunately it's not in the same intellectual league as "South Park: Bigger, Longer & amp; Uncut."
Granted, that's a high-water mark that's hard to match. But "Team America" has one ace the "South Park" movie didn't: Its characters are marionettes, puppets operated by blatantly visible strings. As symbolism, a satire can't start out much better than that.
Funded by corporations, not the government, Team America is a group of young, attractive, skilled operatives who span the globe making the world a safer place for Americans. No historic landmark is spared in their quest to take out potential threats to the United States.
Premise of movie
Gary (voiced by Parker) is an actor starring in the Broadway production of "Lease" (an alternate-reality, "everybody's got AIDS" version of "Rent"). He's recruited for Team America because he's the only actor good enough to pose as a Middle Easterner and infiltrate a terrorist group bent on using WMDs.
Gary hesitates, setting up a priceless jingoistic montage set to a creaky country tune that mocks "God Bless the USA." But he joins Team America and as a welcome gift he gets to get it on with Lisa (voice of Kristen Miller) in the most awe-inspiring display of puppet sex ever filmed.
What Gary and the other Team America members don't realize is that North Korea's Kim Jong Il (Parker again) is really the evil mastermind behind the world's terrorist activity. And the Hollywood liberals who make up the Film Actors Guild (F.A.G.) are playing right into his plans.
Directed by Parker from a script by Parker, Stone and Pam Brady, "Team America: World Police" doesn't have the fine-tuned feel of the "South Park" movie. It seems like a film Parker and Stone threw together to rag on self-important political players and pundits.
Critique
The songs are amusing but lack the unforgettable lyrics and hooks of "Bigger, Longer & amp; Uncut's" tunes. The plot seems like one from an early draft instead of a carefully honed script.
However, that's also part of the charm of "Team America." While they're skewering politics, Parker and Stone are out to rip the bloated filmmaking of producer Jerry Bruckheimer and director Michael Bay.
What better way to do that than with a crude parody of Bay and Bruckheimer's overblown action films (singling out their wretched "Pearl Harbor")?
"Team America: World Police" never mentions George W. Bush or John Kerry, and it spends as much time bashing Alec Baldwin, Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon (who don't do their own voices) as faceless hawks. Its only message is that Americans need to be able to laugh at themselves.
"Team America: World Police" delivers the laughs and then leaves. It's quickly forgettable fun.