Trivia / South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut

• Approval of God:
  • Brian Boitano loved the song "What Would Brian Boitano Do?" and has embraced his association with the South Park franchise. He's performed skating routines to the song and even has his animated self as his Twitter profile picture.
  • When reporters asked Kim Campbell, Consul General to the United States and former Prime Minister of Canada, about the song "Blame Canada", she replied that it was clearly satire (against Americans, no less) and didn't find it offensive in the slightest.
  • Anne Murray is name-dropped in "Blame Canada" as one of the terrible things about the country. Murray herself thought this was hilarious and even wanted to sing the song at the Oscars (which she was invited to do), but had another commitment and couldn't go. Robin Williams did it instead.
  • Conan O'Brien, who frequently invited Trey Parker and Matt Stone as guests on (the real) Late Night with Conan O'Brien, naturally had them on to promote the movie and the clip they showed was "his" suicide. His only "complaint" was Do I Really Sound Like That?, although he commented that his interns (who had seen the movie, and loved it) thought it ridiculous that the movie depicted the Late Night set as being on so high a floor of the 30 Rock building, a criticism which would hold water with exactly zero people who didn't work there.
• Banned in China: Distribution was never even attempted in Iraq for obvious reasons. However, after Bush's troops invaded the country and captured Saddam, they allegedly played the movie in his cell.
• Censor Decoy: Trey and Matt have said that their original cut was rated NC-17, then they retooled it by taking out the "offensive" stuff and putting in things that "were five times worse". The new cut was rated R. Here is a memo written by Matt detailing what he thinks should replace the scenes the Censor Board noted as too far.
  • Even the title was an example of this. Parker and Stone originally wanted to call it South Park: All Hell Breaks Loose, but the suits vetoed it on grounds that the title could not contain profanity. The duo sarcastically suggested Bigger, Longer, and Uncut as a subtitle, and were flabbergasted when the executives missed the obvious phallic Double Entendre.
• Completely Different Title: The movie was billed in Czech Republic as South Park: Peklo na Zemi (Hell on Earth)
• Cut Song: "Something Must Be Done" for the adults planning the war with Canada, and then a reprise for the kids planning to stop them. These were replaced by "Blame Canada" and "What Would Brian Boitano Do?", respectively.
• Directed by Cast Member: Trey has the directorial credit on the film.
  • The European French dub was directed by Gilbert Lévy, who also reprised his roles from the series as Jimbo and Mr. Mackey.
• Dueling Dubs:
  • Two dubs were produced for the Latin American market in 2000, each one by a different ADR studio in Mexico. The version by Sensaciones Sonicas for Warner Bros. was heavily censored in dialogue to adhere to the standards of local TV, and did not dub any of the songs. An alternate version by Intersound SA (produced for cable TV by Paramount) did not soften any of the dialogue, and dubbed the songs. Although this version was later released on Paramount's Blu-ray, the censored version is better known due to its prominence on network TV, as well as having been aired by MTV Latinoamerica and being put up for availability on Netflix.
  • There are also at least two French adaptations. The European French dub did not dub the songs, while a more obscure Quebecois version dubbed all musical numbers. Christophe's nickname was also changed to "The Weasel".
  • The first dub was released in Hungary in 2000, but became controversial among fans for recasting some of the characters. In 2010, the channel Filmmuzeum commissioned a new dub that would more closely match up with the show's voice cast.
• DVD Commentary: For the 2009 Blu-Ray release, Paramount included a full length commentary hosted by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, where they talk about their fights with the MPAA and Paramount, and also call some of the crew members to talk about some of the insight of the production of the movie. They also admited they haven't seen the movie ever since it's release in 1999.
• Fake American: Brooke Shields is played by British actress Minnie Driver.
• Fake Nationality: One of the Canadian fighter pilots is voiced by Nick Rhodes of British New Wave band Duran Duran.
• Irony as She Is Cast: Sheila leads a war against Canada over a cartoon. Her voice actress, the late Mary Kay Bergman, was close friends with Canadian-born Tara Strong.
• Life Imitates Art: There were reports of underage teens purchasing tickets to Wild Wild West and jumping to this film instead. Trey and Matt were not happy about this... because they hated that film and were mad that they inadvertently helped it make more money at the box office.
• Non-Singing Voice:
  • Big Gay Al is usually voiced by Matt, but Trey does his singing voice.
  • Trey provides Gregory's speaking voice, but his singing voice is actually reserved for Howard McGillin.
• Orphaned Reference: Shortly before "Uncle Fucka", Terrance is seen holding a letter that seems to have appeared from out of thin air. This was part of a joke in an earlier draft that was ultimately cut:
  Terrance: Well, fuck my ass and call me a bitch! I just got a letter!
  Phillip: A letter from who, you shit-sucking cockmaster!
  Terrance: It's from your mother.
  Phillip: My mother sent you a letter? What's it say?
  Terrance: It says, "Dear Terrance, please don't ever tell my son that I licked your hairy balls".
  Phillip: Oh, you fucking ball whore!
• The Other Darrin:
  • In Spain, the voice cast was almost completely different from the one used for the TV show. However, Margarita Ponce (the TV voice of Cartman) wound up as Stan's mom for the movie.
  • The toned-down version aired on Mexican TV kept the voice actors for the four boys and Wendy from the local series dub, although many supporting characters were recast ^note In particular, the boys' parents, Chef, Mr. Garrison, Phillip and Mr. Mackey. Clyde also went from being voiced by a man (Carlos Hugo Hidalgo) to a woman (Isabel Martiñón). A less-edited version for pay TV had Kenny and Wendy receive completely different voice actors^note They were voiced by Irwin Daayán and María Fernanda Morales in the TV film dub and the original Audiomaster series dub. Their actors in the pay TV dub are Víctor Ugarte and Gaby Willert as well as numerous more changes to the supporting cast. Interestingly, the original voice actor for Gregory (Enzo Fortuny) wound up performing the role of Mole in the alternate "dirtier" dub.
  • The Japanese dub cast is different from that of the show too, with Stan, Kyle and Kenny voiced by women (as opposed to their TV dub actors) and most of the cast unknown due to the lack of proper credits. The film was also not handled by WOWOW, but by Shochiku Entertainment, who dubbed it for the Kansai market in Japan. As a result, the film contains Japanese subtitles for non-Kansai dialect.
  • The Brazilian dub (made in Rio de Janeiro at the Cinevideo studio) predated a TV adaptation by BVI Communications (and later Kitchen Inc., which is based in Miami), and features a completely different cast. While Stan, Kyle, Ike and Cartman are voiced by women in the TV series, they had male voice actors for this version.
  • George Clooney voices the doctor in the film, while he was voiced by Trey in the series. Although said doctor was also renamed from "Dr. Doctor" to "Dr. Goauche".
  • In the Italian dub, Fabrizio Manfredi replaces Fabrizio Vidale as Kyle. The replacement was also kept for Seasons 3-4.
• Recycled Script: The film is an extended musical version of the episode "Death" (at least the plot where Sheila tries to shut down Terrance & Phillip for obscenity, sans the B-plot of Stan being harassed by his grandfather who wants to die because he's too old to live). Here, Kyle's mom overreacts to Terrance and Phillip and gets the other parents to protest against them (only mass suicide is changed to war).
• Sleeper Hit: No one expected the film to be as popular as it was, or especially the glowing critical response. "Blame Canada" was nominated for an Oscar for Best Original Song and performed by Robin Williams at the ceremony, that alone is unusual since the category is usually filled with serious anthems and love ballads, and in turn made it one of the most well received musical numbers in the ceremony's history (even if they lost to an anthem).
• Surprisingly Lenient Censor: When Trey and Matt were told they couldn't use the subtitle All Hell Breaks Loose because "hell" is a curse in America, they sarcastically suggested calling it Bigger, Longer and Uncut, and were surprised that the ratings board had no issue with the phallic double entendre.
• Technology Marches On: The "Windows 98" gag; Rule of Funny at the time, but now you'd wonder why the US military would consider having an operating system so outdated.
• Troubled Production: As stated below, Trey and Matt often fought with both Paramount and the MPAA over the film's content and release. There is a famous photocopy of a memo passed around where Matt goes over specific lines and details of what they cut (cut 'hole' from 'asshole') and what they are keeping (scene with Cartman's mom and the horse "this is one scene we are really fighting for"). At the end Stone says "P.S. this is my favorite memo ever."
• What Could Have Been: It has it's own Bigger Longer and Uncut Page.
• Working Title: It was supposed to be called South Park: To Hell and Back but they weren't allowed to put the word Hell into the title of a movie so they named it after an uncircumcised penis as revenge.
• Writer Revolt:
  • Trey and Matt fought with the MPAA in a daily basis. Matt reported that every time they were asked to cut something, they would re-submit the film with a replacement "ten times worse and five times as long".
  • The two also fought with Paramount over ways to promote the film. Both were irritated with a music video that the studio had made for MTV for "What Would Brian Boitano Do?", opting to create their own version. Alterations were made as late as two weeks before its release. It has also been stated that Parker and Stone hated the initial theatrical trailer, feeling that it misrepresented their intent, that Matt Stone actually stole the reel for it and swapped it out with one he and Parker had personally created.
  • Trey and Matt began feeling the film's production would burn every bridge they had in Hollywood, and decided to go down swinging. They even sent handwritten faxes to executives saying "Compliance + You Doing Nothing = Success" and openly said none of them knew how to do their jobs. Thankfully, the film's surprise success saved them and the series' future.
  • Executives tried to get Trey and Matt to make a PG-13 film instead of an R-rated film. Trey and Matt would not budge, feeling that a PG-13 rating would betray what the show stands for.

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