The thinking man's poop humour.
Director: Jo Beom-jin
Cast: Ryoo Seung-beom, Lim Chang-jung, Hyeon Yeong
Country: Korea
Not since Japan’s colorfully twisted “Dead Leaves” have I seen a movie, animated or otherwise, as fucked up as “Aachi & Ssipak” from South Korea, and I say that with all due respect.
How is this for a premise?: Aachi and Ssipak are two hoodlums earning a dishonest living in an energy depleted future dystopia; they hold up bathroom stalls where people are trying to have “sincere” bowel movements, as the energy source of tomorrow is human excrement. All citizens are implanted with anal identity tracking chips at birth, and when they defecate in public stalls they receive an addictive, hallucinogenic popsicle called a “juicybar” as a reward, which also functions as a laxative.
An addiction to juicybars can sometimes, of course, cause people to birth small, blue, and simple-minded mutant children. These mutants have been organized by a totalitarian charismatic leader into a revolutionary cell called “The Diaper Gang” (an ironic name, since they have lost total ability to shit) and they are constantly hounded by police forces, aided by an unstoppable government cyborg named Geko. Everyone wants to control the juicybar supply, including the two aforementioned anti-heroes, who always manage to be in the right place at the wrong time despite their general ineptitude (or perhaps because of it).
Now enter Jimmy the Freak, a drug-addled porn director who stumbles onto a means of tricking the system into over-dispensing juicybars and he hands this information to the leader of the Diapers. They then recruit anti-heroine and wannabe-pornstar Beauty (a woman imbued with the power to crap several times a day) to be the vessel for a “blessed” anal chip and soon accidentally lose her to Aachi and Ssipak (the latter of whom has fallen in love with her from afar). The three share the wealth amongst themselves and become outrageously rich from selling juicybars in the black market, while the police and Diaper Gang are hunting them down.
Phew.
If you can stomach a movie that takes place in a future where power is money and money is shit, then you’re in for a treat. “Aachi & Ssipak” took 8 years to complete and cost millions in production, so it’s more than just some cheap dirty ‘toon. It’s actually a very fast-paced and intense action animation chock full of gorgeous CGI, high-octane gun battles, and really vibrant colors. Think John Woo meets “South Park”, and you’d be pretty close. And as goofy as the plot is, which is tantamount, you would think, to that of a cheap B-movie, “Aachi & Ssipak” takes itself just seriously enough for it to be ranked up with some of the best of Asian animations, like “Dead Leaves” or “Afro Samurai”; other anime features considered politically incorrect but with enough balls to pull it off gracefully.
But the reason “Aachi & Ssipak” does pull it off so well is because it’s indeed a cartoon. If this had been live-action, it probably would have been too much; poop is only funny in theory. Same rule goes for the aforementioned movies, as animation gives it’s creators much more freedom when it comes to perverted and/or offensive humour and action and their audience greatly benefits. But above all, “Aachi & Ssipak” has a very strong political message despite it’s obsessions with fecal matter, T & A, and gore. Much like the Cambodian government of 1975 (or any number of contemporary African governments), the political authorities of the world portrayed in this film are facing an insurgency of fanatical children soldiers (The Diaper Gang) led by a cult-like totalitarian leader who compares himself to Jesus Christ (a la Kim Jong-Il of North Korea). The world in which they live is very Orwell-esque, as the government makes addicts of it’s citizens, pushing them to poo more and more everyday, and even keeping a close eye on the number of times they defecate a day; one can go to prison if they don’t meet their monthly quota!
The only downfall of this movie is it’s inability to engage the viewer after the first 60 minutes. By then, the viewing audience is ready for anything and the film’s twists and turns are everything but shocking. The toilet humor (pun intended) is dropped at that point in exchange for more bullets, bloodshed, and explosions, so there is almost no plot to focus on anymore. Still, “Aachi & Ssipak” is a fun-filled attack on the senses that’s worth a view if you have ever owned an Adam Sandler record. Further proof that Koreans can make action movies like no other, no matter how absurd the premise.
this is so weird.