Spoiler Alert: This article contains spoilers for the film Sausage Party and its very mature, R-rated themes.Sausage Party was released in 2016 and arose as one of the most outrageous comedies of the past few decades. Producer and star Seth Rogen is no stranger to controversy (let’s not forget the potential conflict with North Korea based on his comedy film The Interview). The film was massively successful, and a new Sausage Party TV series from Seth Rogen is in the works.In this animated adventure, food items seek to learn the truth about their fate and relationship to the gods. The gods are basic human consumers who “choose” the food items and take them to the groceries’ version of paradise, called The Great Beyond.
However, everything they have been led to believe is a lie, so it’s easy to see how Sausage Party can use this concept for some clever insights towards organized religion and the hold it has on this edible population. In addition to their idea of paradise, these food items are separated by class and societal beliefs. They are as far apart as can be, despite their daily hymn in which they sing in unison, praising the gods. Their praise and admiration for the humans is only one aspect of the film’s religious themes. In fact, Sausage Party is loaded with metaphors and references that show how organized religion divides and conquers.
An Ode to the Gods
Sony Pictures
The film opens up with a Disney-like musical number where the food products pledge their allegiance to the consumer gods. This resembles a churchly hymn sung in unison on a Sunday morning mass. However, there are some clever innuendos, specifically by the sausages who state they are to remain in their “packages” until the gods choose them, and the buns who wait until they’re “chosen” to open for a sausage. This musical sequence sets up a large amount of exposition in just two minutes. The food items see the humans as these magical beings who should be worshiped and praised. But in the very next scene, the store manager comes around and throws out expired food in an overly dramatic sequence.
After this sequence, the sausages talk about how the gods work in mysterious ways. Frank, voiced by Seth Rogen, talks about how they base their entire lives off of the song without any basis or proof of what their version of paradise is. Nevertheless, rules are broken when Frank and the hot dog bun Brenda (Kristen Wiig), “touch tips” and get out of their packages (akin to having sex before marriage), and the bad luck only gets worse.
The Great Beyond
When Honey Mustard, voiced by Danny McBride, speaks the truth of The Great Beyond, he becomes an outcast and perceived like he’s crazy. No one believes him and his atheistic preaching resembles those who disregard the integrity of organized religion. The Great Beyond is not like it is perceived to be. While the truth was hinted at previously, the actual realization of The Great Beyond is nothing short of terrifying. The film does not hold back in displaying the brutality of kitchenware warfare.
Why is it so dark? Why is it so violent? Perhaps it is meant to show how jarring the truth of reality can be for someone so engraved in organized beliefs. It is such a drastic transition from this Disney-like utopia to a dark and sinister reality, and enough to make someone temporarily fast from food altogether. The humans have this hold over the food items. The quest for kinship with the gods turns into a prison break towards truth.
Unparalleled Sin
On their quest to find the truth about The Great Beyond, Frank encounters the Non-Perishables. In this hidden corner of the aisle, the truth about the gods is revealed while the group smokes from a kazoo. No, we are not making that up. Nevertheless, drugs leading to the truth about the religion mirrors a type of discrepancy that exists within some spiritual practices (here, it’s emblematic of Indigenous groups’ use of ayahuasca and other mind-opening drugs). This clarity leads to the truth — that organized religion (in the case of this film) was all made up.
In addition, a human who takes bath salts is able to see the talking food items first hand. While this could be some kind of meta representation about the psychedelic nature of a film like this, it tends to show that the level-headed and sober are suppressed while the intoxicated are free; much of the film is about the clarity which can arise from doing what you want (sexually, chemically, ideologically) rather than what you’re told without any basis. Nevertheless, the Non-Perishables are the ones who turn the food-verse on its head.
Before the Non-Perishables, the food taken away by humans were understandably horrified by their fate — they would be butchered, masticated, and killed. So they made up the story of The Great Beyond so that the food wouldn’t live in complete terror all the time. But their mission to lighten the fear of nothingness and violence took on a life of its own as the grocery items embraced this message of The Great Beyond and made it their lifestyle. This ideology mirrors our own society’s terror when dealing with death. We tell ourselves these stories to make the path towards death seem a bit less scary. Comedians like George Carlin were notorious in this area of pointing out the logic and hypocrisy in a traditionalist society. In the end, what happens is a full embrace of what was once called unparalleled sin.
One Last R-Rated Sausage Party
The beginning of Sausage Party showed the food items reserved and restrained to their packages and beliefs; they abided by the rules of the gods and lived their lives by the words of the song. However, the ending sequence showed the food engaging in behaviors that completely contrast tradition. Their “party” represents sexual liberation and a kind of communal freedom which organized religion (and individualistic consumer society) often neglects. When the food realize they are in charge of their own destiny, made possible by defeating the gods, they literally bring the house down. The physical house is torn apart with a violent, revolutionary glee, but the figurative house of tradition is also dismantled because they no longer live their lives by traditional values.
The ending of this film is completely absurd and at times… off-putting. It resembles the sexual liberation and drug crazed frenzy of the 1960s and 1970s, a no-holds barred time when all traditional values went out the window. Organized religion was becoming outdated and personal expression was all the rage. Ultimately, the ending shows how it is possible for those with different beliefs to come together and celebrate being alive.
This film can be explained by one of the final lines in the famous drug-fueled film Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas:
“Too weird to live, too rare to die.”
