Alferd Packer: The Musical (1996)

Director:

Trey Parker

Writer:

Trey Parker (screenplay)

Release Date:

15 August 2008 (South Korea)

Genre:

Biography | Comedy | Horror | Musical | Western

Tagline:

All Singing! All Dancing! All Flesh Eating!

Plot:

The sole survivor of an ill-fated mining expedition tells how his taste for gold was replaced by that of human flesh.

Plot Keywords:

Mountain | Lost | Reporter | Rocky Mountains | Flashback

Cast

Dian Bachar	...	George Noon
Stephen Blackpool	...	Black Cat
Stan Brakhage	...	Noon's Father
Dan Brother	...	Guard #2
Duster	...	Liane
Brad Gordon	...	Mills
Ian Hardin	...	Shannon Bell
Dave Hardin	...	Drummer
Edward Henwood	...	O.D. Loutzenheiser / The Cyclops
Jon Hegel	...	Isreal Swan
Andrew Kemler	...	Preston Nutter
Steve Jackson	...	Sheriff of Lake City
Jessica James Kelly	...	Tiny Tim / Baby Packer
M.K.	...	'The Dropout' (credit only)
Marty Leeper	...	Sheriff of Saguache

Also Known As:

Cannibal! The Musical (USA) (video title)

MPAA:

Rated R for comic gore/violence and some language.

Runtime:

95 min | UK:97 min (video)

Country:

USA

Language:

English | Japanese

Color:

Color

Certification:

Iceland:16 | South Korea:18 | Canada:14A (re-rating) | Australia:MA | Canada:18A | France:-12 | Germany:16 | Sweden:15 | UK:18 | USA:R | Canada:13+ (Quebec)

Filming Locations:

Black Canyon, Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, Gunnison, Colorado, USA

Company:

Avenging Conscience

Trivia:

Packer's horse is named Liane after Liane Adamo, Trey Parker's former fiancée.

Goofs:

Continuity: Right before Packer and the others meet the trappers for the first time, you can clearly see that Leanne is tied up. She is also clearly tied up during the "All We're Asking For" song. Right after she ran away, Noon asks Packer if she was tied up and Packer replies that he never ties her up.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Title Card: The film you are about to see was originally released in 1954. Upstaged by the overwhelming popularity of "Oklahoma!", it's short lived theater run was canceled, and "Alfred Packer: The Musical" soon fell into obscurity. The original negative, re-discovered just last year, has been painstakingly restored using state-of-the-art color enhancing and computer reconstruction technology. The film's violent scenes have been edited out for your viewing pleasure.

Movie Connections:

References "Star Trek: Court Martial (#1.20)" (1967)

Soundtrack:

When I Was On Top Of You

Possibly the strangest comedy (or musical) ever made

While my statement could be provided because it is a comedy about a cannibal, I think the film is as strange as it is because it's a comedy/musical about a cannibal. I bet that if the South Park movie didn't have songs it wouldn't make much of a difference of it's greatness (despite them being classics), but in Cannibal, the songs make this film even funnier and turn it from being a lame film about a cannibal into a surprisingly funny if really dumb comedy.

Anyway, Trey Parker's first feature film is presented here and while Matt Stone isn't writing he is a co-producer along with Parker. The film focuses on the only cannibal convicted in America named Alfred Packer. It could've become an equally boring and gruesome film about the scarcely known guy, but it is actually lame for the right reasons by having songs at exactly the wrong time (where else are you going to see frontiersmen sing about dead animals and then argue about being in the wrong key). Not the greatest musical or comedy for that matter, however it is a keen, if ludicrous, freshman effort by the guys who would later go on to make a masterpiece with the South Park show and movie.