My quick rating – 4.6/10. Sweet Meats wastes absolutely no time telling you exactly what kind of ride you’re in for, and that ride smells faintly of grease, country twang, and questionable sanitation. Bobby Sweet (Ricky Glore) is a legendary country music figure and the smiling face of the wildly successful “Sweet Meats” restaurant chain, which he founded with his wife back in 1978. The question hanging over the entire film is simple: how did this roadside meat empire explode so fast, and what exactly makes the meat so…sweet? As the old saying goes, you’d probably be disgusted if you knew what you were really eating – and yes, that warning applies here in the most Troma way possible.
The movie kicks off with Bobby being interviewed by Kerry Swallows (Kaitlin Stephens Guenther), and it’s immediately clear this is going to be fun. When she mentions that the secret ingredient is “the people,” Bobby visibly tenses until she clarifies that she means the people who make the food. That nervous reaction isn’t accidental, and the film slowly lets you in on why. “Slowly,” unfortunately, is doing a lot of heavy lifting here. The story is broken into children’s book–style chapters, presumably to help us keep track of the “intricate” plot, which mostly involves eccentric characters, musical numbers, and a whole lot of stalling before the big reveal.
Jerry Gruoch (Timmy H. Barron) joins Bobby in one of his music videos and quickly becomes a focal point. He’s the intelligence-challenged son of restaurant owner Nick Gruoch (Andrew Gordon), and yes, the actors are roughly the same age, a choice the movie doesn’t even try to justify. While meeting the family, we also get Laddie (Eileen Earnest), the overbearing daughter who rounds out this aggressively uncomfortable family dynamic. The customers are a parade of oddballs with amusing quirks, and the film humorously credits nearly every song as part of the Sweet Meats original soundtrack, just in case you forget whose passion project this really is.
In classic Troma fashion, there’s an extended toilet-unclogging scene, because of course there is. The setup for how the restaurant got started is mildly amusing, but spending roughly 45 minutes circling the mystery of the secret ingredient feels excessive. When the truth finally arrives, it plays like a strange hybrid of Motel Hell and a low-budget country western musical. Surprisingly, the gore is pretty mild for a Troma release, which feels like a missed opportunity given the premise. The music isn’t remotely my thing, but I’ll admit the lyrics are often funny, even if the songs overstay their welcome.
Lloyd Kaufman pops up as Lloyd Duckwood in a fake TV commercial encouraging viewers to “get your suck on,” which is worth the price of admission for us Troma fans. Stick around through the credits for a bonus song, a band getting killed more violently than anything in the actual movie, and an extra video highlighting Jerry’s deeply weird obsession with bananas. Credit where it’s due: Ricky Glore stars, writes, directs, and performs the music, making Sweet Meats an undeniable passion project. If you love Troma humor, you’ll probably have a good time, even if this one lacks the studio’s signature creative gore, so don’t expect another Toxic Avenger. It’s an acquired taste, and while there are stronger entries in the Troma library, there aren’t many that come with this much country-fried weirdness.
