YMMV / Gummo

• Critical Dissonance: The film was horribly received by critics upon release and has both a 19 score and a 38 score on Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes but it has a more positive scores from audiences (6.7 on Metacritic and 73% on Rotten Tomatoes) as the film has gotten more praise the years after its release.
• Ending Fatigue: Many believe that the "Jesus loves me" bit that the film concludes with was unnecessary, and would've had a far stronger conclusion had it bowed out on the rather theatrical montage directly preceding it, set to Roy Orbison's "Crying". Granted, it's only an additional twenty seconds, but Bunny Boy holding the cat up to the camera feels like a more natural point for the film to end.
• First Installment Wins: Often regarded as Harmony Korine's best.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: Bunny Boy's pink bunny ears hat.
• Memetic Mutation: The little girl holding a picture of Burt Reynolds in front of her face and shouting "I WANT A MUSTACHE, DAMMIT!" occasionally circulates the Internet.
• Nausea Fuel: And how.
  • There is one bit of the film dedicated to uncomfortably close home video footage of a dead white cat decomposing and being eaten by flies.
  • A boy removing a family picture from the wall to reveal a gaping hole where a massive number of bugs crawl out.
  • Solomon's bath scene. The bathroom is decrepit in all possible senses of the word, there's a random piece of bacon taped to the wall, and the bathwater is damn near pitch black for unexplained reasons. Solomon seems so unfazed by this that when he drops his candy bar in the water, he still eats it.
• Nightmare Fuel:
  • Any dog or cat lovers might want to skip this film, as it contains ample footage of such animals already dead or actively being killed. Animals are drowned, shot at, whipped, stepped on, and actively decomposing. Korine has publicly stated that the effect was achieved using puppets and stuffed animals, but it likely won't add that much comfort.
  • The scene set to "Little Baby" by Brighter Death Now, a harsh noise track with a sample of a girl confessing to being sexually abused by her father. The music is disturbing enough — as the girl states that her father would ask her to take off her panties and then get on top of her, the music begins drowning out the girl's words, leaving whatever occurred after that unknown — but it's visually accompanied by home video footage of a man presumed to be said father turning and smiling to the camera. The clip is then repeated over and over, making us watch the father's seemingly innocent smile turn into something sinister.
  • The sparse footage we see of the tornado that wrecked Xenia. The way that the low video quality leaves a lot unknown doesn't help. At one moment, we see the tornado begin to touch a house. One Jump Cut later, and most of the house has already been swept away.
  • Solomon's opening monologue detailing how horrific the tornado's effects were, setting the tone for the film in the most bone-chilling way imaginable.
    "A few years ago, a tornado hit this place. It killed people left and right. Dogs died. Cats died. Houses were split open, and you could see necklaces hanging from branches of trees. People's legs and neck bones were sticking out. Oliver found a leg on his roof. A lot of people's fathers died, and were killed by the great tornado. I saw a girl fly through the sky and I looked up her skirt. Her skull was smashed. And some kids died. My neighbor was killed in that house. He used to ride dirt bikes and three-wheelers. They never found his head. I always thought that was funny. People died in Xenia."
• Signature Scene: Either Solomon having a meal of spaghetti, pink milk, and a Nestle Crunch bar in a bathtub full of near-pitch-black water, or Bunny Boy being "killed" by two young, profane cowboys (as this was the scene used to represent the film when it played on a TV in Belly (1998)).
• Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: The whole movie is a showcase of people living depressing lives and getting involved in very disturbing antics to alleviate their boredom.
• Vindicated by History: Was detested and reviled by critics upon release and was a huge commercial failure, yet went on to be hailed as an innovative masterwork.
• The Woobie: Solomon, the Bunny Boy, and the closeted gay man played by director Harmony Korine.

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