Our lead sausage Frank (voiced by Rogen) is upbeat, cheery and randy for his shelfmate Brenda (Kristen Wiig), a bun who returns his affection. This is all preposterous, but stick with it it’s just the tip of surprisingly thorough world-building in this quite-clever comedy. If they are good and obey the gods, they will one day be chosen and taken to the “Great Beyond” (outside the gleaming automated doors in a cart.) But they will only get picked if they remain pure of spirit the “unfresh” get tossed into a dusty bin by a sadist tormentor (actually just a teen bored with his job.) This fear prevents sausages and buns from getting intimate, despite their urges to conjoin. Its occupants (food from around the world) are kept compliant by an unprovable belief system. The supermarket is what Erving Goffman might call a total institution.
