If you still had any questions as to whether or not sexism in America still exists, two of the summer’s most anticipated releases can put your doubts to rest. When it was announced that Ghostbusters would be getting an all female reboot it received an outpouring of internet vitriol. It seemed that every troll in our population felt that this was their call to arms to write the most hateful words possible. In contrast, when Sausage Party released its truly disturbing idea for living and breathing food it was greeted with the population waiting with bated breath. White men revolutionizing a genre (I guess they forgot about Anomalisa) with a vulgar, adolescent movie, what could be better. Ghostbusters did an innovative and inspired effort to bring back the novel concept. Kate McKinnon played a character unlike any we’ve ever seen and that sense of comradery. Though Ghostbusters dealt with the trolls of the internet in nuanced ways and had the occasional call out, they didn’t let the vast amount of haters affect them.

Sausage Party never had the problem of breaking down any walls. They check all the boxes in term of the movies’ main industry, adolescent boys. I’m sure many of the male teenagers at our school lauded this movie as a masterpiece and said it was the best film of the year. Though I personally felt the movie was distasteful at best and gruesome at worst the main problem was that this movie got critically praised and got lots of love at the box office. Sausage Party was innovative in certain parts. However, it seemed again and again Seth Rogen and his team went out of their way to make the most vulgar movie possible. It was almost as if they wanted to prove that this movie deserved its’ R rating at every opportunity it could. It was in your face raunchy and unabashed. It succeeded in doing this beautifully. It was gross and I feared that any kid accidentally walked into that movie theater and stuck around seeing the animation. On the other hand Ghostbusters, which was a far more humorous and reserved comedy with great action as well was received with ok Box office and mediocre reviews.

Though I’m sure those avid Sausage Party supporters will say that Ghostbusters is clearly inferior and less innovative, perhaps no one would like to accept is the very good chance that Ghostbusters would’ve had much better reception if it were a male reboot. The problem wasn’t anything but the general population still not progressed enough to try and break free of the immature male teen constraints the movie industry is confined by. Thankfully this Ghostbusters got made and Colombia Picture had courage enough to tempt the waters and see if teenage males were willing to human up and watch strong females on screen for 2 hours instead of their normal level of comfort with an occasional manic pixie dream girl. Though I won’t say that Ghostbusters was the best movie of the year (That spot’s clearly reserved for Pete’s Dragon) the fact that it was received in the way it was in contrast to the way Sausage Party was is a demonstration of our remaining bias in the movie industry and not the quality of the films. The fact that even now internet commentators are still coming out to now attack Leslie Jones shows that these poor people are still upset that a movie star doesn’t fit their prehistoric ideas. A sausage voiced by a Jewish white man is far more their speed. As uncomfortable it may be for a male to say he prefers a sausage party it tends to be the truth when it comes to cinema. Until we work harder to try and expand what we believe is conventional we will continue to have industries too scared to break the norm because when they’ve attempted they have failed.