Netflix has just released what is perhaps its zaniest, most bats**t film of the year – straight from a comic’s fever dream of the kitsch, sugar-coated paranoia of the 1960s.
We’re talking, of course, about TV icon Jerry Seinfeld’s new film Unfrosted, in which he presents a chaotic origin tale about the creation of the Pop-Tart in Battle Creek, Michigan, complete with a stroke of genius casting thanks to Hugh Grant as Tony the Tiger.
Well, really it’s Grant as voice actor Thurl Ravenscroft, the real name behind Tony’s booming ‘they’re grrreat!’ tagline for Frosties – but more on that later.
The clearest comparison to draw with Unfrosted in terms of its fruitcake tone and bombastic soundtrack is Space Jam, not least because there are so many cereal mascots milling about, from Snap, Crackle and Pop (Rice Krispies) to Toucan Sam (Fruit Loops) and Cornelius Rooster (Corn Flakes).
They mainly appear in a bizarre funeral scene, which involves, bagpipes, opera and vats of milk and cornflakes being poured into the grave, on top of the coffin, in tribute to the deceased. Truly.
Fans who’ve so far watched the movie, which has received a bit of a critical mauling, have been rather taken aback by what they’ve seen.
‘Unfrosted is truly unhinged,’ declared Josh Barton on X, while user Hercules Strong wrote: ‘The cast slapped together for this is nuts.’
Del then chimed in: ‘Unfrosted shakes you by the neck until you laugh at Thurl Ravenscroft s***ting on the floor.’ (Again, more on that later.)
‘Pfft to the bad reviews. I thought Unfrosted was delightful and I laughed out loud several times,’ @Mondalorian added.
Reviews have seen Unfrosted branded ‘one of the decade’s worst movies’ by the Chicago Sun-Times, while IndieWire described it as ‘painfully stale’.
Seinfeld – for whom this is his directorial debut – and the writing team have gone all in on silly gags like naming Kellogg’s head of security ‘Chester Slither’ and featuring a living ravioli creature accidentally created by Kellogg’s ‘taste pilots’ in the Pop-Tart development, which is incredibly random and kind of creepy.
Amy Schumer is the Cruella-esque villain of the piece as Marjorie Post, whose company’s toaster-prepared breakfast pastry Country Squares did, in real life, beat the Pop-Tart to market.
Here, though, she’s pumping dumpster-diving kids for info and supremely unconcerned by trivial matters like health and safety and other such legalities.
She also heads to Moscow with her spineless assistant Ludwin (Max Greenfield) to strike a sugar-smuggling deal with Nikita Khrushchev, as you do, accidentally overshadowing the Cuban Missile Crisis.
So there are clearly jokes and nods to adults in Unfrosted, especially in the scene involving Bill Burr’s horny JFK and the constant suggestion that Amazing Sea-Monkeys inventor Harold von Braunhut (Thomas Lennon) is a Nazi in disguise. He had plans to head to Argentina in the film (*wink wink*), while the real-life Braunhut was an open racist with links to the KKK and neo-Nazi group Aryan Nations.
However, it’s an oddly mixed bag as a lot of the film’s overwhelmingly juvenile humour seems aimed at eight-year-olds, such as when Kellogg’s Bob Cabana (Seinfeld) is forced to run down an aisle of farting cows by the milkmen of ‘greedy ruthless syndicate’ Friendly Farms, headed up by Peter Dinklage.
(The explanation is that they’re hacked off that two leading cereal companies are pursuing a product that makes theirs redundant.)
Adding to the feel that every one of Seinfeld’s famous connections was happy to say yes, regardless of the size or quality of role on offer, Dinklage’s milkman muscle on the ground is Christian Slater.
Other stars involved are Melissa McCarthy, Cedric the Entertainer, Jim Gaffigan, Patrick Warburton and various Saturday Night Live alumni, including Fred Armisen.
And we haven’t even got to the nonsensical – if diverting – scene where Jon Hamm and John Slattery cameo as their suave if ‘mean’ (called out) Mad Men advertising executives Don Draper and Roger Sterling… just ‘cos it’s the 1960s?
But now we come to Unfrosted’s saving grace, as Paddington 2 star Grant near-reprises his role of the theatrical Phoenix Buchanan, a thespian ready for greater things than his career has thus far brought him.
Seinfeld knows this is the character people most want to see, so you’re kept waiting less than two minutes until you do, sweaty-headed as he emerges from the Tony costume.
Ravenscroft’s Shakespearean aspirations see him create a group of players to perform King Lear on the Kellogg’s premises.
This leads to Unfrosted’s most deliciously delivered line as he declares that they are ‘bringing culture to the low-born, dirt-digging Michigo-an’.
Later, the near-inexplicable tone of the movie continues as Grant leads his fellow mascots on the picket line, topless and in an adapted costume of Viking horns on a tiger trapper hat, war paint and a tooth necklace.
After they storm the Kellogg’s building, he is later reprimanded in court as it’s revealed that he defecated in a hallway before yelling: ‘I’ve got some Kel-loggs for you.’
His response? ‘I regret that. I had had a large bowl of bran flakes.’
It’s safe to say there are probably many regrets attached to Unfrosted – although Grant’s involvement is not one of them for film fans.
And if you’re a Seinfeld fan or in the mood for some self-indulgent, silly comedy, it is at least imaginative in its undisciplined creativity.
Unfrosted is streaming on Netflix now.
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