Funny is funny, and 20 days of "America`s Funniest Home Videos" and a 10 of "Jackass" proves it. A scene to the mole is as true a joke as there is. And if the scene comes from a baseball on a tee, a football place-kicked or a ram, bull or buffalo aiming for a man`s center of gravity, so often the funnier.
"Jackass 3-D" fires paintballs and sexual items right into our faces and gives three full dimensions to projectile vomiting and the after-effects of a large dose of laxatives. Yeah, they run out of very interesting things to do to each other and themselves pretty quickly, and out of things that seem cool in 3-D pretty much later the opening credits. But they`re still here, suffering for their art. Now it`s our turn.
A mix of stunts gone awry, sketches and sophomoric gross-outs, "Jackass 3-D" can be as bare and dazed as having a dog bite Johnny Knoxville on the bottom or having a Lamborghini pull a willing subject`s tooth. And it can be as detailed as Bee Hive Tether Ball - scantily clad grown men swatting a hive around a lead ball pole, collecting stings as they do.
The funniest line from the TV show and all three movies is never "Hi, I`m Johnny Knoxville and this is Electric Avenue" (a stun-gun obstacle course). It`s the opening disclaimer - that these stunts are "performed by professionals." That`s what makes them funny. They`re not professional anything.
The sketches are what work better in this film. A staged dwarf brawl surprises unsuspecting bar patrons with a Small People love triangle, then a fight, dwarf cops coming in to break it up, dwarf paramedics arriving to draw out the injured. Knoxville dons convincing old age makeup to do assorted "bad grandpa" gags with his scooter, his sexual tastes and his bowel movements.
But the actors from "Jackass" aren`t getting better, they`re getting older. Their teeth have all been fixed. Their growing paunches just mean more territory to cover with tattoos. A lot of what was cute when they were comic losers willing to try anything for a joke a decade ago can appear a little desperate now. The peals of laughter by Knoxville, Steve-O, Bam Margera and the crowd can feel forced.
It`s faintly amusing to see Knoxville trampled underfoot when he roller skates in a buffalo herd, though the sight gag isn`t quite as queer as the Roger Miller tune that accompanies it.
And this fixation on feces isn`t juvenile. It`s infantile, puerile and gag-inducing. Cast members and a cameraman lose their luncheon in this one, not exactly comic paydirt.
At least with every expected pratfall, somebody in that large ensemble - from the blimp-sized Preston Lacy to the Wee Man - has the front of judgment to ask, "What did you THINK would happen?"
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