Tom Green's internet promo

April 16, 2001 9:51 PM

Tom Green's internet promo for his new movie is, typically, both funny and mean. I'm wondering if I'm going to get any tech support calls because of this?
posted by sixdifferentways (35 comments total)

Oh my God... I laughed so hard at that I think I woke up the neighbors... I totally woke up my roommate. We laughed like we were stoned or something... that is hilarious!!
posted by fusinski at 11:18 PM on April 16, 2001

Considering in the past few months, I've come across students asking me, "What's an mp3?" and telling me that they're going to "Go download some bandwidth," I'm just giddy wondering what their reaction to this would be.

Hail to the computer illiterate!
posted by dequinix at 12:13 AM on April 17, 2001

to dequinix:

they'll probably push the screen with their plump fingers
er ...what's a c drive anyway?
posted by elle at 1:03 AM on April 17, 2001

to quote one of my all-time favorite movies:

Michael Bolton: "That is the worst idea I've ever heard."

Samir Nieninajar: "Yes, its horrible... this idea."



Did anyone else ever get that computer game promo (I think the game was called Virus) that did this exact thing except it went full screen, and was far more believable than that? It must have been like 3-4 years ago....?
posted by howa2396 at 1:21 AM on April 17, 2001

Too bad they didn't do a Mac version as well.

Us Mac users always left out of the good stuff: the pranks, the virii, the macros, the trojan horses, the "your Internet is not optimized" banner ads...
posted by Mo Nickels at 3:41 AM on April 17, 2001

i was hoping for another look at mister green jerking off that horse, oh well :/
posted by sawks at 3:44 AM on April 17, 2001

"Now, right-click on My Computer."

"How do I get to your computer?"
posted by techgnollogic at 3:46 AM on April 17, 2001

So, there are people who think Tom Green is funny? Interesting.
posted by Outlawyr at 3:49 AM on April 17, 2001

What the? I'm not at all sure what's funny here, wasn't this already done like over and over again? I'm sure there was atleast 2-3 other flash sites that I saw with the same thing? Ohh well.

I didn't even know he had a movie out, isn't this the one with Dennis Miller and Spade? No wait... I don't know, so many bad movies coming out these days it's not even funny... they've even taken over the foreign section of film with that cthd kung-fu flick. argh.

Btw, anyone want to produce 'Fishing with John : The Movie'?
posted by tiaka at 5:55 AM on April 17, 2001

"Oh, I see they have the internet on computers, now!"
posted by Dane at 6:24 AM on April 17, 2001

Ack. Stupid jittery fingers. Ironically, a friend just sent that Virus promo to me yesterday. I was amazed how quickly it could erase my hard drive without even making a sound.
posted by Dane at 6:30 AM on April 17, 2001

you know, that joke could be out there a thousand times over, but if it's the first time you've seen it, it IS funny. and it's especially funny if you happen to know someone who would freak out and really think their hard drive was being deleted, like my mom for instance.

i haven't seen any of his movies but i used to watch the tom green show and i think he is funny. one of the best things i ever saw on t.v. was that skit where he had his dad's car airbrushed with the "dirty" picture on the hood.
posted by centrs at 8:24 AM on April 17, 2001

That Tom Green! He's CA-RAAAAAAZZY! Whoo! He totally freaked me out with that ancient, creaky, decrepit gag of his! He's edgy in a way that could only be backed by the indie cred of 20th Century Fox!

"Welcome to your room, Mr. Green. You'll be sharing it with that gentleman whimpering in the corner. His name is Yahoo Serious."
posted by Skot at 8:35 AM on April 17, 2001

Sadly, I, too, know probably a dozen people who would believe this if they saw it, and I work for a Major Software Company.

I know I'm an old fart and all, but can somebody tell me again just what they find funny about this guy? I shudder to think of the world 20 years from now when they look back at Tom Green, Adam Sandler, David Spade, et.al. and call it "The Golden Age of Comedy".
posted by briank at 8:42 AM on April 17, 2001

There's a shot in the trailer for "Freddy Got Fingered" of Green playing some kind of keyboard. With strings tied to his fingers. Said strings running to some kind of contraption on the ceiling. From which is suspended a plethora of sausages. As he plays the keyboard the sausages dance around. He is singing, "Daddy would you like some sausage, Daddy would you like some sausage" to his discordant self-accompaniment.

I'm sorry, but if you don't find that even slightly funny, there is something seriously wrong with you. It is so perfectly, so absurdly, Pythonesque.

I can't see how the rest of the film could possibly measure up to that moment. But it doesn't matter, as long as that moment exists, it could exist entirely outside of the film and still be perfect.
posted by kindall at 9:35 AM on April 17, 2001

The other way to look at it, kindall, is that there's something seriously wrong with the people who do find sausages hanging on a string funny... I did find the Pythons funny - not always, but pretty consistently - but have yet to see a single Tom Green piece that even makes me smile (eating a live mouse? now, there's great comedy...) There's a world of comic difference between wise men who act like fools but somehow cannot hide the fact that they're wise (my take on the Pythons) and stupid men who act like fools because that appears to be all they know how to do (my take on Green).
posted by m.polo at 9:59 AM on April 17, 2001

For Kindall and everyone else: I posted just that snippet of the trailer (995k Quicktime) to my own site several weeks ago, because I just could not stop staring at it. Now I don't consider myself a fan of Tom Green at all, but something about the way this shot was framed, the deadpan reaction of Rip Torn... while I'm not quite sure if it's funny, I know that I can't stop watching that clip.
posted by toddshot at 11:48 AM on April 17, 2001

Tom Green seems like an either/or kind of comedian. However, even if you like his stuff, the movie is said to be catastrophically terrible (surprise!). Nobody (and I mean nobody) wanted to direct it, which is why Tom did it himself. If anyone else has seen the promo video they've been sending to reviewers, you'll probably agree that the marketing strategy here seems "Let's make them want to see the movie a lot less."

That said, the sausage keyboard bit is kind of funny. To bad he had to stick it in a feature film.
posted by sj at 11:56 AM on April 17, 2001

The sausage bit is funny. Not $8.50 funny, though. Not $2.50 cheapie theatre matinee funny, either. 3 a.m. and I can't sleep, oh, what's this on HBO funny - maybe.

But the same could be said about anything starring Adam Sandler, Deuce Bigalow, anything with Farley and/or Spade, etc. etc.

Nevertheless, I predict that Freddy Got Fingered will open at #1.
posted by Dreama at 12:30 PM on April 17, 2001

"I'm sorry, but if you don't find that even slightly funny, there is something seriously wrong with you."

You know...every time I hear that ad come on the air again, I stop what I'm doing and look up just so I can see that scene again. It just doesn't stop being funny, and I have no idea why. Probably because it's so incredibly ludicrous.

It almost makes me want to see the movie, just so I can see what's going on in that scene. I'll probably wait and rent it, though.
posted by CrayDrygu at 12:37 PM on April 17, 2001

It's oddly compelling in a sick, nefarious way. It draws in ordinarily quiet, self-possessed people with its evil power.

Conclusion: Tom Green may be satan.
posted by Dreama at 12:46 PM on April 17, 2001

I like Tom Green, and Adam Sandler, and Rob Schneider. They're stupid, and I have no explanation except for the fact that I may quite possibly be stupid myself.

I don't so much like David Spade though.
posted by cCranium at 1:31 PM on April 17, 2001

i don't care what you all say about adam sandler, billy madison was a fucking BRILLIANT movie. "shampoo is betta! i go on first and clean the hair!" "conDITioner is betta! i leave the hair silky and smooth!" "OH REALLY, FOOL?"

the sausages thing makes me lose it every time. brilliant. also the cheese helmet bit. i just wish they wouldn't try to stick a *plot* into the movie.

the funny thing about the virus thing wasn't the lame "i'm destroying your computer! bwaha!" bit, but him laughing at th end. THAT's what made me almost fall down. "HA HA HA HA! HA HA HA! HA HA HA HA! HA HA HA!" good stuff. ^_^

did anyone see tom on conan o'brien the other night? that might have been one of my favorite conan appearances ever, save everything scott thompson's done on that show.
posted by pikachulolita at 2:04 PM on April 17, 2001

I think the likes of Tom Green and Adam Sandler appeal to the hyperactive, out of control adolecent in all of us...unless you were never a hyperactive adolecent. Then, well, you probably just like math or something "interesting" like that...
posted by Hackworth at 3:37 PM on April 17, 2001

can I just say...

"the price is WRONG, Bob!"

"Get in the hole! That's your home, don't you want to go to your HOME?"

Dumb is funny. It is entertaining without the task of enlightening civilization in any way, shape, or form.
posted by owillis at 3:49 PM on April 17, 2001

There's a shot in the trailer for "Freddy Got Fingered" of Green playing some kind of keyboard. With strings tied to his fingers.

I don't know what it is, but I find that clip rather disturbing. Not disturbing in a bad way.... but disturbing all the same. I plan to see the movie, just to be able to say I did... plus I would like to see the full scene that clip is a part of...
posted by elf_baby at 4:16 PM on April 17, 2001

There's a world of comic difference between wise men who act like fools but somehow cannot hide the fact that they're wise (my take on the Pythons) and stupid men who act like fools because that appears to be all they know how to do (my take on Green).

The Pythons might have been silly to a fault at times, yet at the core of many of their bits you find references to Proust or Hegel or Fellini, inspired parodies of all of those and more. Absurdity in the Python material stems from the ability to turn comedy in on itself. Calling Tom Green "Pythonesque" is to misunderstand both. I'll save the $8.50 for my next Python DVD and skip the sausages, thanks.
posted by briank at 6:32 PM on April 17, 2001

Skot nailed it. I propose a missing link between Yahoo Serious and Tom Green. Carrot Top.
posted by artlung at 7:58 PM on April 17, 2001

I'll maintain that sausages are just as inherently funny as penguins and parrots. Yeah, Python's a good deal brainier than Green, but they could be absurd just for the sake of being absurd.

For the record, I don't care for Tom Green either, much. I am not what you would call a fan and I generally prefer my humor a little more cerebral. Eating a live mouse isn't funny, nor even entertaining; it's just gross. Despite my misgivings about Green, I just thought that sausage clip was brilliant. You could have pretty much anyone sitting there doing what Green was doing and it would still be weirdly funny. Of course, Green apparently wrote the movie so he probably deserves credit for coming up with that bit. For the first time, I'm harboring the hope that the guy may have a nugget of true comic potential buried somewhere under his schtick. And maybe he'll eventually lose the schtick.

And you know, while I don't like Adam Sandler's comic persona at all and I think his movies generally suck, I have to say, I do like his songs a lot.
posted by kindall at 8:36 PM on April 17, 2001

Having seen "Happy Gilmore" many more times than I care to remember - yes, I'm mental - I just have to correct the quote:

"Son of a bitch ball, why didn't you just go HOME? That's your HOME! Are you too good for your HOME? Answer me! Suck my white ass, ball!"

Ahem. Go ahead and shoot me, I'm an Adam Sandler fan. I can't help it.

As for Tom Green, I'm undecided. Sometimes it's funny (the porn-mobile; walking down the street, wearing a beret and stalking people whilst talking about cheese sandwiches and soda) and sometimes uncomfortably weird (drinking milk straight from a cow's teat and convincing someone to do same; putting a moose head in his parent's bedroom at 3am).

The trailer made me laugh (especially the "daddy do you want a sausage" clip - I thought I was the only one who found that utterly hilarious), but I'll probably wait until it's a rental.
posted by sammy at 9:30 PM on April 17, 2001

Just a note: he didn't actually eat the mouse in Road Trip, he just put it in his mouth for a while and let it run around.

I saw his Conan appearance and it was pretty good, but I'm a fan. Anyone who thinks to have a suit made with the same colours and pattern as Conan's couch get's a checkmark in my book.

In other news, one of the guys I work with has been wandering around singing "Daddy would you like some sausage?" for a couple of days now, and I can't get the damn tune out of my head.
posted by cCranium at 6:53 AM on April 18, 2001

owillis: Dumb is funny.

Ah, but dumb also runs the extremely high risk of being seen as just dumb.

That said, the link didn't make me laugh (other links may) and Tom Green is very spotty. [ref] As cC said, though, the idea of wearing a couch-coordinated suit strikes me as quite humorous and thus, he's spotty.

I can say that within the realm of Dumb Humor, Tom Green is probably the most creative, although I'd say that's a dubious honor. Adam Sandler is a one-trick pony, and David Spade is close to being in a similar rut. It all makes me want humor like Andy Kaufman's again.

Also, elle: [the computer illiterate will] probably push the screen with their plump fingers... Am I to infer that the computer illiterate are all plump?
posted by hijinx at 7:34 AM on April 18, 2001

"Am I to infer that the computer illiterate are all plump?"

No...just their fingers.

"The fingers you have used to dial are too fat..."
posted by CrayDrygu at 11:10 AM on April 18, 2001

Maybe its my age speaking, or maybe I didn't "get it" but Andy Kaufmann is decidedly unfunny to me...
posted by owillis at 11:16 AM on April 18, 2001