There’s been a lot of talk, especially in the movies, about what the world ‘needs’ after COVID.
It’s pretty common to see the phrase “exactly what the world needed!” plastered on a billboard for some new West End show that’s meant to get you all loved up and optimistic about the future. It’s so ubiquitous that it’s entered into popular discourse too – I know a lot of my friends are talking about the supposed return of the ‘Roaring 20s’. And, you know what, cynical as I might be, it’s a very fair thing to say. The MCU ‘needed’ Spiderman: No Way Home after its year-long slump. The cinemas ‘needed’ the long-awaited return of Bond. I ‘need’ a girlfriend. They’re all very valid points.
But, guys, I’ve found it.
I’ve found the answer. The answer to satisfy every question. Dear readers, the world is no longer in need. Because all it needed, all it ever asked for, all it could’ve ever possibly ever ever wanted, was 90 glorious minutes of Steve-O’s balls being slapped by blunt objects. Fuck you, Martin Scorsese – this is cinema.
Jackass is back, and it’s better than ever.
Well, it’s not really. It’s the same as it ever was, no worse, no better, and, trust me, that’s a good thing. Jackass movies, to their credit, always stick to a rigid formula (people getting hit by stuff) and don’t mess around with trying to form a coherent plot or creating a self-conscious meta-commentary on the true significance of people getting hit by stuff. Everything in this film is doggedly done to serve a singular purpose – making you laugh. I was very kindly invited to a press screening at the Cineworld in Leicester Square, and, upon arriving, was offered unlimited free beer and snacks (also went for a wee next to Bill Bailey). I have never felt the level of communal joy that I felt in that cinema on that evening. Every single gag got a massive laugh
The boys are mostly back. The two big hitters – Johnny Knoxville and Steve-O – are on incredibly fine form. Shockingly fine form, considering all they’ve been through. I have watched these men break more ribs and destroy more brain cells than should be legal. I hope they have a lovely retirement – I saw a very apt Youtube comment saying that we live in the rare timeline where they haven’t died. Equally, the incomparable Wee Man and Ehren McGhehey are still being physically abused. Ehren in particular goes through some horrific gauntlets in this one, the worst of which involves a shock collar, horse semen, and a bear. Where else are you going to get this calibre of entertainment?
There are two glaring omissions from the cast. The first: Bam Margera has been cut from the film after the director, Jeff Tremaine, was forced to issue a restraining order against him, following years of Margera’s personal struggles with drugs and alcohol. Margera was fired from the movie after breaking his contractual sobriety, and responded with lawsuits and threats towards multiple cast members. To me, his absence from the film was not felt. It is a real shame to see how Margera has suffered after Jackass, but I’m still glad that the film hasn’t also suffered because of it. The other absence is Ryan Dunn, who tragically died in a car accident in 2011. There is an impression throughout the film that the cast, despite their insistence on hurting themselves, have become more sensible, older, and wiser – I am sure that the loss of a friend has had no small part in contributing to this.
Celebrity cameos are, mostly, great. I feel like Tyler the Creator has been trying to make a Jackass movie throughout his whole career, so actually seeing him in one felt almost poetic. Similarly, The Eric Andre Show has been markedly influenced by Jackass (it largely consists of people getting hit by stuff) so seeing Eric himself hanging out with the boys was lovely. I do not know what Machine Gun Kelly was doing there. Ever since I saw that video of him dancing on the boardroom table, I can’t even think about him without getting a little bit upset. Do people like Machine Gun Kelly now?
As Mark Kermode said, there’s something oddly touching about a film that (in contrast to Hollywood’s general objectification of women) is incredibly candid in its presentation of the male body. Rather than vilifying, sexualising, or aggrandizing the penis, the film (maybe unintentionally), by merit of its graphic content, can’t help but present the penis as nothing more than another part of the body. There is absolutely nothing sexual about someone growing a beehive on the end of their dick, nor being shot with a hockey puck in the gonads. There are male bodies of all shapes and sizes in Jackass, and they are all shot in such an unflinching way that it almost becomes poetic.
However, this discussion of bodies raises another point that has been used to critique Jackass: its apparent exclusion of any women, both in front of and behind the camera. Jackass Forever goes a (very small) way in improving upon this with the addition of comedian Rachel Wolfson to the sausagefest. Her main gag – The Scorpion Botox – is explicit in its concern with gender expectations (namely, the expectation of female movie ‘stars’ to look nice), and sees her plumping up her lips with the swelling of a scorpion’s sting. She tells Eric Andre how much pain she is in, and he responds: “but you look great though!”. Jackass‘s showboating of pain tolerance and attention seeking (a term that Steve-O lovingly describes himself with) is decidedly a product of its ‘boys club’ mentality, which a more critical thinker than me might want to explore. However, I really don’t care. The audience in my theater was pretty evenly divided in gender, and everyone was laughing in equal measure. To me, that’s all that matters.
The thing is is that this isn’t a five star film, really. The fact that I have given this film the same rating as the recently released masterpiece Drive My Car (directed by Ryusuke Hamaguchi, please go and watch it) goes to show how insane a unified rating system for movies is. But I ask you to try and leave the cinema after this movie and tell me that it’s not perfect. Because it is. It’s great. I don’t think I want any more of Jackass now, but this is still great. It’s going on my list of ‘movies to show Victorian children’. I reckon it would kill at least one of them.