User reviews

i went expecting to see a really stupid teen comedy, and was a bit surprised, because it exceeded my expectations but in a good way. it really starts with all the clichés you can expect, but later develops into something really watchable and entertaining. after the first few minutes then i was ready to leave the cinema - i went to watch the movie at a free 'Advance Movie Screening' in Cinema Village and expected that it is a new movie, so after the first few minutes i thought 'why are they still making stupid movies like this? don't they think we had enough of this crap already'? but now that i see it was released in 2004, i'm kinda relieved :) so...after the first about 10 minutes, as the movie develops, i began to see some real story develop, with nice dialog, funny moments (even grossly funny, but hm...in a good way :)

actually - why am i writing such a long comment? 3 years after its release, there isn't a single comment on this movie here, and even at the free prescreening there were so few people....i actually intended to go see 'Lust, Caution', but apparently the interest there was huge...

but to get to my point - this is actually a good movie, you just need to give it a chance, and i believe you'd enjoy it

peace

A fair-to-middling low-budget comedy, "Freshman Orientation" has some good-natured fun lampooning the stereotypes and clichés of college life. Kewpie-faced Clay Adams is an undergrad frat pledge who pretends to be gay in order to snag the girl of his dreams. Just how this paradoxical turn-of-events comes about need not be reiterated here. Suffice it to say that it involves fraternity and sorority initiation pranks that wind up at cross purposes with one another.

Suffering from its own case of identity confusion, director Ryan Shiraki's screenplay reinforces stereotypes even as it's working hard to beat those stereotypes down. Gays, in particular, may find themselves evenly divided between encouragement and dismay over how they are portrayed in this film.

Still, there are enough moments of loopy charm to make the film worth seeing on a slow, rainy afternoon, and Sam Huntington and Kaitlin Doubleday have appeal and charisma to spare as Clay and his girl. And, as an added bonus, they are joined by John Goodman and Rachel Dratch in minor supporting roles.

This is one I always kind of hesitated to watch and ended up finding reasons not to sit down and just watch it. But when I finally did...wow. I wish I hadn't.

Freshman Orientation (the better of the two titles it was best known as) is one of those movies that you watch and you can see that there were some good ideas and maybe even some good intentions in there, but literally none of them is even remotely well-realized in the resulting movie. While there may be points later where it seems to pay off, it takes too long to get there, doesn't make up for the time wasted, and really isn't worth the extremely unpleasant journey.

It takes every opportunity to toss out offensive epithets, unfunny attempts at gutter humor, and caricatures that the main audience probably wouldn't recognize. If you do recognize the characters they're supposed to be...you'll be offended at how poorly they're done. There's so much comedic potential here, it's just never brought to a point where it's funny. It could have been a fantastic satire and commentary on these types of people we all know and have met, but it failed in every respect.

And while I'm not saying low-brow gutter jokes are inappropriate -- college frat settings are perfect for that -- it takes a special kind of failure to fail at that kind of humor. How can you miss on that? Gutter humor is made to amuse the lowest common denominator!

The whole affair is so abominably poorly-done that it's really hard to figure out who you're supposed to care about, as the audience. All of the characters are horrible, stupid, or in some way completely unsympathetic. They seem to be going out of their way at every moment to be hard to like. At no point will you ever think "that character seems like somebody I'd like to be friends with" unless you are a psychopath.

When you get down to it, perhaps the largest and greatest problem this movie suffers from is that it has no audience. If you're a fan of "fun frat" style movies, you'll have no fun at all with this movie. If you're gay or lesbian, you'll find this movie unpleasantly ugly and offensive, as well as annoyingly smug and self-satisfied, with no reason for it to be. Audiences that are here for fraternity silliness and boobs (which the film does provide) won't want to experience the piled-on homophobia and hate, and they won't recognize most of the cartoonish caricatures. Audiences familiar with the hardship of being gay and out probably won't find any entertainment in experiencing one unpleasantness after another related to it that strike a little too close to home, without any real comedy that manages to work balancing it out.

Anyone else will find it difficult to watch, much less enjoy, a film that has zero likable characters, zero jokes that actually work, and zero fun. Please, watch something else. You will regret the time you spent in this horrible abomination that wastes what few decent actors it gets on something that I can't imagine they were too proud to put in their portfolio.

I was extremely disappointed with this movie. It looked like it might be one of those unheard of movies which end up making you laugh for hours. I instead found myself groaning every scene as gay stereotypes are reinforced and the entire depiction of life in college and gay rights activists is warped so severely that it becomes unrecognizable except as a caricature to be used like a punching bag for the movie's comedy. The superficial perspective on LGBTQ life highlights this movie's writers' affinity for stereotypes that would make even a Westboro Baptist Minister blush. My gay friend commented this movie sets back the view of gay people by 15 years and I would have to agree. The IMDb title "Home of Phobia" is jarringly accurate.

Ryan Shiraki, whoever he is, wrote and directed this awful, unfunny and forgettable piece of cinematic crap. He assembled a fairly impressive cast, including John Goodman, to participate in perhaps the worst movie in what has been a distinguished career for him. The inane plot centers around this adolescent acting heterosexual imbecile pretending to be gay, so that ironically he would be more appealing to the opposite sex on the college campus who embrace gay men. It only goes downhill from there, with the hateful 'f' word thrown around coupled with female characters who debase women everywhere. Racism is also center stage here. Everyone is so bad, you actually don't know who to be angry with. If you find homophobia, racism and misogyny at all humorous, and have an iq south of 50, then this is your movie. In my opinion, Ryan Shiraki is the biggest culprit here. He needs to go back to school and learn how to write without using hateful and offensive language in order to get cheap laughs.

I saw this many years ago in the American Pie era and it was relatively funny. Not the greatest but it had it's moments and the classic 'Hit Me Baby One More Time scene"

In 2022 it hasn't aged well and can come across as a little offensive in terms of how far we've come with gay rights, I can understand if the LGBTQ community could be offended by this movie and the stereotypical tone of the movie.

I still enjoyed it on rewatching it but there were some 'ooh they didn't moments, especially in 2022.

It's a fairly low budget movie though they did manage to score a decent soundtrack and John Goodman. It's definitely of the teen gross out era which is no longer as funny as they used to be when the novelty wore off years ago.

Way back in the dark ages of ' Gay ' cinema there was a film called ' The Gay Deceivers ' about guys pretending to be gay so that they would not be drafted into the army. In 2004 the dark shadow of that film looms over this one, except in the most crass way it tries to show that Gay men and Lesbians are really just like everyone else, except that they are not. Boy kisses girl at the end and that is not a spoiler it is an indictment of this film trying to have it all and hoping an LGBT audience would respond to such patronage. Hard to say no spoilers but I will try not to give away the plot. In simple, and I do mean simple terms a young man pretends to be gay as the desired girl will only go out with him if he is!!! And eventually the heterosexual couple see that cupid sends the right arrow into the right heterosexual place. Along with this a few predatory bisexual Lesbians have fun, and one nice young man eventually does find out he is gay, but the ending says it all. Exploitation of so-called gay politics with an elderly gay man getting sentimental about Stonewall, and how he was there. As for the film itself it wallows in crudity and the acting leaves a lot to be desired. I am happy that LGBT cinema has moved forward into its deserved maturity, and hoping that it will look back in bewilderment at films like this.

Caught this movie on HERE! on Demand. What a nice surprise. Completely funny throughout, appealing characters, and interesting story. The premise revolves around a straight college guy who pretends to be gay to get closer to a girl he likes. This could have been another "I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry" which I found a bit offensive and patronizing. What's so refreshing about the film is that the film has a gay sensibility but does not try to preach gay acceptance. The characters are who they are. Sam Huntington as Clay was extremely appealing in the lead role. Lots of hilarious supporting characters too including Rachel Dratch as a very drunk, very old college student, and John Goodman who nailed it as a local bartender who teaches the lead character how to "be gay." Heather Matarazzo was a bit over the top as the New York Jewish girl but funny nonetheless. It's rare to find a movie that I have never heard of, yet enjoyed so much. I think whether gay or straight, if you are looking for a fun teen comedy, you will enjoy this film.

Good watch, could watch again, and can recommend.

Sam Huntington, Marla Sokoloff, and Kaitlin Doubleday are all extremely underrated actors and do excellent jobs.

I'll give you that this premise is potentially problematic, but it does have a positive edge to it. What really holds the movie back (or forward for some) is how sociopathic the main character starts.

There has to be a low to grow from, but yeesh. It is a coming of age and self discovery story for about 6-20 people, depending on how you count, and there is a lot of good work that goes into balancing and keeping so many character plot lines to quality.

A couple of the characters literally stop to shake off how much is going on in the movie at certain points.

In the end, this is full of absurdist comedy with a sweet core.

You know, this movie have that light comedy that I like to watch sometimes, its not that kind of movie that tries to make you laugh every time, but its still funny. The title in Spanish was translated and it means "How to seduce a girl?" I think it makes the point, but you'd better watch it. Sam Huntington its a very good actor, another movie of him that I consider a 10 its "Detroit Rock City" even if you are not a rocker you enjoy it a lot, the story is simply funny and original, as this one but you know in this case I gave to Home Of Phobia a vote of 9 that is still good. Note: If you are homophobic you better don't watch this movie