Is Freddy Got Fingered one of the worst movies ever made, or is it a hidden but hilarious masterpiece that changed comedy forever?
Having the opportunity to make a Hollywood movie like Freddy Got Fingered is something that the vast majority of us will likely never encounter in our lives. There are billions of us in the world, and only so many movies by the prominent studio executives. Creative visions are never in short supply, but it’s hard to know when your idea can be applied to the silver screen. You can be too late to modern trends and end up with a product that feels antiquated as soon as it is released, or you can be far too early to the punch and find yourself accidentally disrupting your career entirely.
The latter can be painful to experience as a creative, but what happens when the world finally catches up with what you were doing two decades prior? Today, I want to talk about Tom Green’s Freddy Got Fingered and explore how a film initially viewed as a vulgar nightmare is now considered a cult comedy masterpiece.
Before the film’s release, Tom Green made quite a name for himself as a creative, if unusual, mind. After a short-lived career as a rapper, he quickly found success on Canadian public access television with The Tom Green Show, a variety show featuring live performers filmed in front of a studio audience. In 1999, MTV then picked The Tom Green Show, which expanded the show’s reach into the United States. In that success, Green quickly found himself at 20th Century Fox with a 14 million dollar budget, and with that Hollywood cash behind him, he created the film Freddy Got Fingered.
When Tom Green’s big screen debut was released in theatres on April 20th 2001, it was met with almost universal disdain and was widely considered one of the worst films of all time. Most major critics dismissed Green’s humour and the many juvenile sequences throughout the film that abandoned even the most basic components of storytelling. With a Rotten Tomatoes approval rating of just 10%, you’d be hard-pressed to find many people who did, in fact, enjoy the film back in its initial release. During its theatrical run, Freddy Got Fingered only just about made back its production budget, resulting in a financial disappointment for 20th Century Fox. However, despite the cold reception, the film began to undergo a unique transformation from a hated but ultimately forgotten financial disappointment to a cult masterpiece that laid the foundation for modern comedy today.
After its theatrical release and tepid box office, Freddy Got Fingered was released onto home video later in 2001, where it began to find success and appeared consistently on DVD charts. Soon after, fans of Tom Green and those willing to dive into its chaotic and disgusting humour began to appreciate what Freddy Got Fingered had to offer. It’s a $14 million comedic nightmare that enters the screen, feeling like a giant middle finger to Hollywood and the audience. Frankly, you can’t help but respect the sheer lack of care on display at every turn. In the age of streaming, it’s hard to really put into words how much easier it was for somebody to enter Hollywood and disrupt the system the way Tom Green did.
In the 90s, Hollywood went through an indie boom, with studios such as Miramax finding success in micro-budget comedies and dramas that were low risk and potentially high reward. In this search for new creative blood, filmmakers like Kevin Smith, Quentin Tarantino and Richard Linklater found themselves at the forefront of a new chapter in Hollywood history. In a way, Freddy Got Fingered is the end point of this era of independent auteur-driven filmmaking. It’s vulgar, absurd and utterly disinterested in the traditional way of making a movie, turning itself into an artistically careless but effective piece of art, no matter how far Tom Green pushes the limits of audiences.
A film that involves its lead character wearing the skin of a dead moose or delivering a baby while swinging it around by the umbilical cord is one you likely wouldn’t expect to see off the written page, let alone in a wide theatrical release long before streaming. However, these moments make Freddy Got Fingered such an unbelievable yet fascinating piece of filmmaking. By riding this line of absurdist humour and straight-up “anti-comedy” throughout, Tom Green deliberately tests the audience and almost demands that they just give up and leave the room.
Despite the film being a lean 90 minutes, Green packs it with so many comedic bits in exchange for a narrative that it feels double the length. While this is something that would work to the film’s detriment, Green somehow figures out a way where it just works perfectly in sync with the rest of the chaotic stuff going on here.
Twenty-three years later, the influence of Freddy Got Fingered is felt all over modern comedy. Adult Swim’s The Eric Andre Show and Netflix’s I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson have both proved that there is a massive appetite for chaotic humour that we’ve only really begun to process. Freddy Got Fingered truly does exist as one of the few movies that was just incredibly ahead of its time.
Tom Green took a Hollywood budget and utilised it to begin a new era of comedy far earlier than anyone was really ready for. In doing so, he harmed his potentially big movie career but cemented himself as a legend in the comedy industry. Green did the one thing many people can only dream of: make a movie that’s unapologetically him. It wasn’t for everyone, but it wasn’t meant to be. It was Tom Green’s giant middle finger to Hollywood, and the movie industry translated into a 90-minute nightmare of excess that you just can’t help but adore for its sheer commitment to the bit.
Freddy Got Fingered isn’t a movie for everyone, but what it represents is far more universal and human. It’s a stunning example of how filmmakers should perceive Hollywood. Instead of adhering to studio notes and traditional marketability for maximum profit, Tom Green turned his Hollywood movie into his personal playground. A place where producers were left bankrolling his most bizarre ideas with little time to explain what it all could mean dramatically or emotionally. Not every joke will hit, but by the end, you’re not laughing at the comedy but at Tom Green’s ability to play a prank on the studio executives who were convinced to greenlight what you see on screen. Freddy Got Fingered is one giant joke, not at the audience but at Hollywood at large, and frankly, you can’t make a better comedy than that.
Freddy Got Fingered is now available to watch on digital and on demand.
