Freddy Got Fingered

Name me a Tom Green film that came out in the last 10 years. You can’t, can you? Civilised society wins again.

The Partially Educated Review

And on the 8th day, Satan created Tom Green

In 50 Words or Less: Tom Green masturbates a horse. If that sells it to you, suffer through this. You deserve it.

In Detail: Goes to find that “flogging a dead horse” GIF.

There we go. It’s a gracious mercy that Tom Green has always been fairly well ignored over here in England. I remember The Tom Green Show first arriving over here and the palpable sense of indifference that came with it. Proof, if needed, that England has excellent taste when it comes to television shows.

Oh, sod off. This lack of care changed a bit when Freddy Got Fingered arrived, with a lot of interest suddenly appearing from teenage boys who gave the instant stamp of approval to anything remotely scatological. Usually, I was one of those teenage boys and yet, at at time when I liked most films that I was too young to watch, Freddy Got Fingered became one of the two main films that taught me how to hate my television screen. The other one?

It’s a charming tale of a man who wants to follow his dreams of being a professional animator. A man who, along the way, masturbates a horse, accuses his father of sexually molesting his younger brother (oops, sorry, spoilers) and swings a newborn baby around by it’s umbilical cord. Amongst other things.

Ordinarily, when a film is this bad, it involves having to root out the blame. You need to be fair, you need to make sure that everyone is held accountable for their actions. The writer, the director, the star. They must all share blame if it is there to be equally shared. Oh wait, Green is all of those things. This one’s for you, mate!

Now, I’m happy to accept that this sort of reaction may be precisely what Green wanted. There is enough in this film to suggest that Green was wanting to make himself into a real-life Max Bialystock, taking the notoriety that came with it and the ability to say: “at least I’m remembered for something”. Which is a mentality I just don’t get. Anyone can make themselves remembered. Tomorrow, I could go commando, walk into work and drop my chinos and I can guarantee that image is getting etched into everyone’s brain for all time. If anyone I work with is reading this, don’t worry, I’m not going to do it.

He’s failed though. Not at making a bad film. No way. This is a film so bad that if someone put a gun to my head and gave me the option of watching this one more time or only being able to listen to Mika for the rest of my life, I’d definitely want some time to think about it. Actually, imagine that. Imagine that the only thing you can hear for the rest of your miserable existence is THIS…

It’s not half as offensive as it’s trying to be though (the film, not Mika. Mika is very offensive). Mainly because it’s all so laughably transparent. Any initial wincing or grimacing that you may feel will go away fast, followed by the bleak, harrowing realisation that you just spent 87 minutes of your life watching celluloid dreams die. Those 87 minutes aren’t coming back. They’re gone. Lost. Wasted. And Tom Green has managed to make just as much of an impression on your life (be it good or bad) as a fart on the other side of the world.

ONE out of 10

Blended

I said to myself: “this week, you should really try and write something positive”.

And then I decided I don’t feel like writing something positive. I feel like destroying something. I feel like taking a sledgehammer wrapped in barbed wire and smashing the last vestiges of life out of something (entirely metaphorical, I assure you). Who could I possibly turn to for fulfilment of that purpose?

The Partially Educated Review

"Hello darkness, my old friend"

In 50 Words Or Less: would give away the last paragraph of the review. So read that.

In Detail: I will say this and you can choose whether or not you want to believe me. I don’t hate Adam Sandler quite as much as you would probably expect me to. Go back to some of his earlier work and there’s some enjoyable enough films kicking around in there (yes, Happy Gilmore). Then he started providing Rob Schneider with his own starring roles. As well all know, this yielded similar levels of success as would asking the Westboro Baptist Church to co-ordinate the global security for all Pride events. Though there were a couple of acceptable moments after that, the downhill slide was taking on a sharper gradient. Then Jack And Jill came down from the hill with no broken crowns and decided to dash the audience’s brains out instead. He hasn’t recovered since.

With Blended, Sandler made two fairly fatal mistakes. First off, he decided that he wanted a holiday in Africa, but should be entitled to make money from said holiday. As if that’s not enough to resent him for, he also seemed to think that Round 3 of his partnership with Drew Barrymore was also something everyone wanted. 50 More First Dates, anybody?

One of the worst box office openings of Sandler’s career followed and his box office reliability began to look a lot like this.

Here's your plot. After a blind date that’s just as painful for the characters as it is for the audience having to sit through it, Sandler and Barrymore’s paths just can’t stop crossing; a bit like my eyes after the convoluted chain of events that leads to them accidentally holidaying together in Africa. Most of the film’s humour comes at the expense of both characters' young children. Barrymore has two sons: a serial masturbator (remember, this is a Sandler film) and a tantrum throwing adrenaline junkie. Sandler, meanwhile, has three daughters. One of them’s there to be cute, but they still allow her to make devil noises and (in the film’s longest running joke) the other two apparently look like men. Despite the fact that one of them looks like this.

As ever, Sandler has failed to grasp the rule of three when it comes to a joke. Instead, his every amusement is rammed harder into the ground than a rat under a skyscraper. Further to the problem, rule of three’s only applicable if the joke is actually funny the first time. My face after every "is she a boy or a girl?" joke:

By this point, Sandler has been peddling his brand of humour for 25 years and it's not hard to argue that a lot of those who liked him at first have become fed up. Those who never liked him to begin with have taken such a joyous pleasure in his dwindling financial successes that I’m starting to wonder if they laugh when a puppy gets shot in the face. As for that handful of people who are still tolerating Sandler…

I went in to this film with a ONE out of 10 for it to improve upon and developed a system that would enable it to do that in a fair manner. For every time a joke in this film made me laugh I would give it one more point. That’s right, if it made me laugh 9 times I would be obligated to give this film a TEN out of 10, in spite of whether or not I hated everything else about it.

TWO out of 10