While the rest of Hollywood obsesses over the next CG blockbuster, the creators of South Park are playing with puppets. For their latest film, Team America: World Police, Matt Stone and Trey Parker eschew computer graphics for wooden dummies and WYSIWYG garage geekery. "I hate what CG has done to movies," says Stone. "Filmmakers too often substitute technology for a good story. There's something so much more exhilarating about watching stuff that's real."
Real 22-inch-tall marionettes are what you get in this $20 million send-up of bloated action epics. Due in theaters October 15, Team America tracks a special task force that must save the world from terrorists armed with weapons of mass destruction. The film stars 90 puppets, including knock-offs of John Kerry, Michael Moore, and North Korean dictator Kim Jong II.
Puppeteers manhandle wires and rods to move the characters using the same supermarionation technique employed in the '60s cult TV series Thunderbirds. But Stone calls his method "supercrappynation" because the wires remain visible and sophisticated articulation is replaced by jerky verité.
Though the puppets look simple, they're more like robots on strings: They have intricate armatures, ball-and-swivel joints, radio receivers, and up to nine servo motors inside their heads. A digital data recording and playback system guides their facial movements; its animatronic controls include a scriptable mode in which mouth, forehead, and eye motions can be programmed to automatically match dialog inputs. All the data exchange between the puppets and the control board occurs wirelessly via a 900-MHz radio signal.
Of course, not everything is so high tech. When the Taj Mahal blows up, you can rest easy knowing it's just a flat photo mounted on foam core.
- Xeni Jardin
credit Melissa Moseley
Puppeteers bring wooden dummies to life on the movieés set.
credit Paramount Pictures
The gun-toting muppet squad descends upon Cairo.
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South Park's Puppet Regime
