Sausage Party is a 2016 adult animated black comedy film directed by Conrad Vernon and Greg Tiernan (in his feature-length directorial debut), and written by Kyle Hunter, Ariel Shaffir, Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg. A co-production between Canada and the United States, the film features the voices of Rogen, Kristen Wiig, Jonah Hill, Bill Hader, Michael Cera, James Franco, Danny McBride, Craig Robinson, Paul Rudd, Nick Kroll, David Krumholtz, Edward Norton and Salma Hayek. The film follows an anthropomorphic sausage (Rogen) who lives in a supermarket and goes on a journey with his friends to escape their fate as groceries eaten by humans.
The film's animation was handled by the Vancouver-based Nitrogen Studios. It is the first 3D computer-animated film in both United States and Canada to be rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America. The film's rough cut premiered on March 14, 2016, at South by Southwest, followed by its general theatrical release in the United States on August 12, 2016, by Sony Pictures Releasing through its Columbia Pictures label. Sausage Party received generally positive reviews from critics and grossed $141 million against a budget of $19 million, surpassing South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut (1999) as the highest-grossing R-rated animated film at the time of its release.
A sequel television series, Sausage Party: Foodtopia, was released in 2024.
Plot
Unbeknownst to humans, a supermarket called Shopwell's is populated by anthropomorphic foodstuffs, as well as some other consumable items, that believe human shoppers are gods who take purchased groceries to a utopia known as the "Great Beyond". Among the groceries is a sausage named Frank, who dreams of living in the Great Beyond with his hot dog bun girlfriend Brenda.
One day, Frank and Brenda's packages are purchased by a shopper named Camille Toh. On their way out of the store, a returned jar of honey mustard tries to warn the groceries that the Great Beyond is a lie, but nobody listens except Frank. Before committing suicide, Honey Mustard tells Frank to seek out a bottle of liquor named Firewater. Honey Mustard's suicide creates an accidental cart collision that causes Frank, Brenda and several groceries to fall out of the cart, including Jewish bagel Sammy Bagel Jr., the Arab lavash Kareem Abdul Lavash and an aggressive douche who swears revenge on Frank and Brenda after his nozzle is bent on impact.
Seeking to verify Honey Mustard's warning, Frank leads Brenda, Sammy and Lavash to the liquor aisle where he meets Firewater and his colleagues, the Non-Perishables (a box of hominy grits named Mr. Grits and a Twinkie named Twink), who tell Frank that they created the noble lie of the Great Beyond to assuage the groceries' fear of being eaten. To their dismay, this has had the unintended effect of the various aisles developing divisive belief systems based on their own prejudices and interpretations of the original "revelation". Despite Firewater's warning that he will not be believed, Frank vows to reveal the truth and is encouraged to travel beyond the store's freezer section to find proof. Brenda, Sammy and Lavash are brought to the Mexican food aisle by a bottle of tequila, who is secretly working for Douche. Teresa del Taco, a lesbian taco, develops a crush on Brenda and helps them escape Douche.
Meanwhile, at Camille's house, Frank's two best friends, Carl and Barry, are horrified to see the shopper cooking the foods. Carl is stabbed to death as he tries to flee through an open window with Barry. Afterwards, Barry encounters a human drug addict, who becomes able to communicate with his groceries (one of them being Gum a Stephen Hawking-like wad of chewing gum) after injecting himself with bath salts. The bath salts wear off and the addict prepares to cook Barry, but he accidentally burns himself and Barry yanks his shoelaces, making him slip and causing a hanging battle axe to fall and decapitate him.
Frank reunites with his friends, but they separate again when they along with Brenda disapprove of his skepticism of the Great Beyond. He reaches the Dark Aisle, and discovers a cookbook beyond the freezer section. He reveals its contents to the store's inhabitants who panic at first, but Frank's condescending tone and failure to offer a positive alternative prompt them to cling even more strongly to their beliefs, and his claims and evidence are dismissed. Suddenly, Barry, Gum and the other groceries from the addict's home return with the man's severed head, proving that the humans can be killed. Barry apologizes to Frank for not helping him when he fell out of the cart. The group drugs the human shoppers and employees with toothpicks laced with bath salts, whereupon a battle begins. Several humans are gruesomely killed by the now unified groceries while Douche takes control of the store manager, Darren, and uses the human's body to take a bite out of Frank's torso. Brenda saves Frank as Barry and the other groceries catch Douche and Darren in a garbage pail strapped to propane tanks. They are then launched out of the store as the tanks explode, killing them both. Afterwards, the inhabitants celebrate their victory with a massive orgy.
In an epilogue, Frank and his friends visit Firewater, who has had a psychedelic experience with Gum and discovered that their world is not what they think: they are merely animated characters voiced by actors in another dimension. When, Gum has constructed a portal to this dimension and the group travel there to confront their creators.
Voice cast
Seth Rogen as Frank Frankfurter, a sausage who sets out to discover and expose the truth about the "Great Beyond" Kristen Wiig as Brenda Bunson, a hot dog bun who is Frank's love interest Jonah Hill as Carl, a sausage who is friends with Frank and Barry Bill Hader as: Firewater, an old bottle of Native American liquor and the leader of the Non-Perishables Tequila, a bottle of Mexican tequila who works for Douche and later gets killed by him after failing to bring Frank and Brenda to him Michael Cera as Barry, a short and deformed sausage who is friends with Frank and Carl James Franco as Druggie, who is the first-known human to discover the food's anthropomorphism after injecting himself with bath salts Danny McBride as Honey Mustard, who is returned to his shelf upon the shopper who purchased him mistaking him for regular mustard and tries to warn Frank and the other products of the reality of the "Great Beyond" Craig Robinson as Mr. Grits, an African-American box of grits and a member of the Non-Perishables. He has a grudge against crackers, a pun on the pejorative term Paul Rudd as Darren, the long-time store manager of Shopwell's who is famously nicknamed the "dark lord" as he disposes of expired food and spilled items Nick Kroll as Douche, a psychopathic douche and Frank's arch-nemesis, who seeks revenge on Frank for accidentally breaking his nozzle and ruining his arrival to the "Great Beyond" David Krumholtz as Kareem Abdul-Lavash, an Arab lavash who has an on-and-off rivalry with Sammy. His name is a play on Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Edward Norton as Sammy Bagel Jr., a neurotic Jewish bagel who has an on-and-off rivalry with Lavash. His name is a play on Sammy Davis Jr. Salma Hayek as Teresa del Taco, a lesbian Mexican taco who is attracted to Brenda
Scott "Diggs" Underwood as: Gum, a super-intelligent but paraplegic wad of chewing gum on a battery-powered homemade wheelchair. He is a parody of Stephen Hawking. Twink, a gay Twinkie who is a member of the Non-Perishables Anders Holm as Troy, a bully sausage who likes to pick on Barry Lauren Miller Rogen as Camille Toh, a "MILF" shopper who purchases Frank and Brenda's packages. Her name is a pun on "camel toe".
Additional character voices were provided by Alistair Abell, Iris Apatow, Sugar Lyn Beard, Ian James Corlett, Michael Daingerfield, Brian and Michael Dobson, Ian Hanlin, Maryke Hendrikse, Nicole Oliver, Kelly Sheridan, Jason Simpson, Vincent Tong, Underwood, Sam Vincent and Harland Williams, as well as directors Conrad Vernon and Greg Tiernan.
An archival recording of Meat Loaf's "I'd Do Anything for Love (But I Won't Do That)" was used for the singing voice of a meatloaf grocery-based caricature of him.
Production Seth Rogen has said that he worked for eight years to get the film made but the content worried most film studios. Noting that the film came from "an innocent place", Rogen stated that "'What would it be like if our food had feelings?' We very quickly realized that it would be fucked up." Evan Goldberg revealed the project to Indiewire in July 2010, stating it was a "top secret super project". Initially, Indiewire was skeptical that the project was real and not a hoax on Goldberg's part, but after vetting, it did confirm that it was in the works. In November 2010, Jonah Hill independently confirmed to MTV News that he was working on an R-rated 3D animated film. Goldberg and executive producer James Weaver said that they had specific targets—Disney and Pixar and DreamWorks films, which they have "ripped apart". Goldberg said, "We're just kind of taking all the conventions of children's movies, and making them disgusting and insane".
The film was formally announced in September 2013 as a partnership between Sony Pictures, Annapurna Pictures, and Rogen, Goldberg and Weaver's Point Grey Pictures. On May 29, 2014, it was announced that the film would be released on June 3, 2016, but the release date was later revised to August 12, 2016. In January 2014, Rogen, Hill, James Franco, and Kristen Wiig were announced as the leads in the film. The other cast includes Edward Norton, Michael Cera, David Krumholtz and Nick Kroll. On April 9, 2014, Salma Hayek was set to lend her voice to the film as Teresa the Taco. It was also announced that Paul Rudd, Danny McBride and Anders Holm would voice characters in the film.
When Rogen originally submitted the film to the Motion Picture Association of America, they gave it an NC-17 rating due to the visibility of pubic hair on Lavash's scrotum during the climactic food orgy scene. Once said pubic hair was removed, the film received its final R rating for "strong crude sexual content, pervasive language and drug use". The film was granted a certificate by France's film classification commission, which was criticized by Catholic groups in the country. The British Board of Film Classification classified the film at 15, although the Blu-ray release was classified 18 because of supplemental material. In Australia, the film was rated MA15+. In Japan, the Eirin rated the film as R15+.
Music
The film's score was composed by Alan Menken and Christopher Lennertz. Lennertz declared that the duo decided to have a serious and straightforward musical approach, performed with a full orchestra at Abbey Road Studios, for feeling that “to try to make [the movie] more funny is the wrong thing to do". Rogen and Goldberg agreed, highlighting that the music was important to "make the ridiculous actually ground itself” and highlight the emotional parts of the film. The film opens on a musical number, "The Great Beyond", which Menken described as a "bouncy, charming and 'prototypical Menken'" nod to his work in various Disney films, with him noting a similar composing process: "We went to the Beauty and the Beast place. We were being very clever, and rhyme oriented. I had three counter-melodies, and of course, a lot of profanity." Menken spent over a year writing alongside lyricist Glenn Slater, with frequent input from the film's writers, who were the ones who added a pun referencing to the Holocaust ("eliminating the juice"), and another referencing the sexual act of "tea-bagging”.
The film's soundtrack album was released on August 5, 2016, by Madison Gate Records and Sony Music Masterworks.
Track listing
Release