Secretly Great Movies: Freddy Got Fingered.

Part one of an ongoing series examining movies that are often dismissed, marginalized, or ignored, but are actually awesome. Being a born contrarian, these are often my favorite kinds of movies.

The story you know:

Released near the height of Tom Green's brief moment of mega-stardom, Freddy Got Fingered garnered almost universally negative reviews, with a notable exception from New York Times scribe A.O. Scott. The film chronicles the misadventures of an aspiring animator named Gord (Green), and his fraught relationship with his disapproving father (Rip Torn). In a mostly negative review, Roger Ebert conceded that maybe he just doesn't get it, and that one day the film would be viewed as a "milestone of neo-surrealism." Freddy Got Fingered won 5 Razzies, and when onstage at the awards ceremony "Green began to play the harmonica and did not stop until he was physically dragged off."

The shocking truth:

The day Ebert prophesied has come. The Wikipedia page for Freddy Got Fingered now has a section for "Resurgence", and refers to how this initially reviled film has attained a cult status thanks to a sensibility that some consider "avant garde" or "akin to performance art." Chris Rock is a confirmed fan, and no doubt others will eventually come out of the closet. Kind of reminds you of another strange, offbeat movie that was initially reviled by critics and later gained a considerable cult following, prompting a revision of its initial judgement: The Big Lebowski.

But you don't have to go online to find evidence of Freddy's influence; the heirs to its deranged brand of humor are everywhere. It could be argued that Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Wonder Showzen, and just about the entire lineup of Adult Swim original content since Freddy owes a significant debt to Green's over-the-top, absurdist aesthetic.

And even if you hate all of those shows (as plenty of people do), the fact is that Freddy was always a great film. Beneath the film's shocking surface lies a universal story about growing up and struggling for parental approval. Or maybe all the horse dicks are cover for an even more disturbing subtext, as this article from Cinema de Merde indicates. Either way, there's a lot more to the film than the juvenile gross-outs that many viewers dismiss it for: it's like Breaking Away as directed by Luis Buñuel, with funnier jokes and doodles instead of bikes.

"I'm sick of symmetry."

In a featurette on the film's DVD, Rip Torn--with an absolutely straight face--even calls Green the best director he's ever worked with. And Torn is not exactly an actor known for his easygoing manner with directors; when outraged by his direction on the set of Maidstone, he hit Norman Mailer in the head with a hammer, while Mailer's children screamed for mercy. (Perhaps this was karmic retribution for Mailer headbutting Gore Vidal.)