Freddy Got Fingered (2001) Review

 

Freddy Got Fingered (2001)

Freddy Got Fingered follows aspiring cartoon artist Gord, who after failing to make it big in Hollywood, must move back in with his parents, much to the dismay of his father. 

When all is said and done, this movie deserves some context with who Tom Green is. This is a guy whose brand of comedy was doing audacious, disgusting, weird, and loudly obscene antics that will either make you hate him or love him, much being the case with Freddy Got Fingered, as it is arguably the most insane movie he ever put out. There’s a reason it is as controversial as it is (some viewing it as awful) and so this review is gonna get into R territory really quick. 

The driving heartbeat of this film is the (rocky) relationship between Gordie and his dad Jim. Their constant banter, fighting in public, and the bounds to which Jim will go to light a fire under Gord’s ass is the catalyst and driving force behind everything that happens, including Gord’s falsely accusing his dad of touching his younger brother Freddy (a plot line that hilariously becomes a self-realization as the movie progresses). There’s a deeper context to it, analyzing the relationship between Gen X and their boomer parents, with the latter often viewing them as good-for-nothing slackers, with the point lying in Jim finally accepting and being proud of Gord for finally making it in the world. 

Along the way however, we get classic Tom Green, with an escalating conflict that involves jerking off animals, playing with a dead deer (and getting hit by a car), beating his handicapped girlfriend’s shins with a bamboo stick, reviving a baby by swinging it from it’s umbilical cord, playing with sausages on strings, and really badly made cheese sandwiches. It’s nuts and borderline disgusting at times but that’s where so much of the humor lies in just how weird and quirky these people and random events are. 

We get a terrific cast, starring Anthony Michael Hall, Eddie Kaye Thomas, Marissa Coughlan, Rip Torn, and of course, Tom Green. This is without a doubt the performance of Rip Torn’s career, as he brings such an insane energy to Jim that is so over-the-top yet fully serious in it's own regard, an aspect that makes his character all he funnier as the film progresses. Mix that with Green’s overly ridiculous performance and you get a side-splitting movie of astronomical proportions. 

Freddy Got Fingered, directed by Tom Green, is an illogically absurd comedy, that much like Green’s career, constantly pushes the envelope in terms of what should ever be allowed in a big studio movie. It's vulgar, but makes a point of balancing shock with classical comedic conventions, of which it breaks free from well, as a dramatic, over the top exploitation of 2000s pop culture. 

9.5/10