Numbskulls farewell: “Jackass” sign-off is more fun than a kick to the groin

Jackass: Best and Last

Starring Johnny Knoxville, Steve-O, Chris Pontius, Wee Man (Jason Acuña), Dave England, Danger Ehren (Ehren McGhehey), Preston Lacy, Rachel Wolfson, Jasper, Dark Shark (Compston Wilson), Poopies (Sean McInerney) and Zach Holmes. Directed by Jeff Tremaine. Now playing at theatres everywhere. 93 minutes. 18A

⭐️⭐️ 1/2 (out of four)

Peter Howell

Movie Critic

Funny how you can become attached to the craziest of people doing the dumbest of things.

Stunt artist Johnny Knoxville and his gang of “Jackass” daredevil doofuses have been part of the pop culture landscape for more than a quarter century, first on MTV and later at the movies. Knoxville’s hair has turned from jet black to snowy white in the intervening years, but his piercing cackle remains the same and so does his yen for mayhem. Production values have risen but not the IQs of the “Jackass” crew.

I’m actually a little verklempt thinking these guys won’t be nailing each other in the ‘nads anymore, but Knoxville says he’s endured 16 concussions and the odds of permanent damage are rising along with his age. He recently turned 55 and many of his fellow Jackasses — including popular players Steve-O, Chris Pontius and Jason “Wee Man” Acuña — are of a similar vintage.

This peace-out edition of their collective gross-out is about 50% greatest hits (but where’s Steve-O’s classic shark bait stunt?) and 50% new stuff, with the best of the fresh material involving a wiseguy robot named Larry who has a penchant for anal probing.

Larry certainly fits right in, but that’s a given for this franchise, both for participants and viewers. There’s nothing halfway about “Jackass,” where the players are both sadists and masochists in their pursuit of snicker-worthy acts of stupidity.

Stunts range from the truly dangerous to the merely doltish. Early on in the film we see Knoxville’s first official act of Jackassery from 1998, when he demonstrated on camera how to stop a bullet fired at point-blank range at his chest, using only a bulletproof vest and a stack of porn mags as protection. (Spoiler alert: he lived.)

More recent acts of insanity include the Poo Cocktail: strapping a player inside a portable toilet and then launching it into the air like a rocket, whereupon it flips its nasty contents all over the unlucky rider.

Merely doltish doings include such Three Stooges nuttiness as stepping on a garden rake to administer a sharp rap to the face, or squeezing into a cardboard box to surf down a set of basement stairs. The box trick actually seems pretty tame, compared to other stunts involving bulls, rockets and Tasers, but apparently it was deemed “too imitatable” and banned by TV censors. (The movie comes with multiple “don’t try this at home” warnings.)

Everybody wants in on the “Jackass” jokes, and this includes at least two famous actors who appear in the film.

Knoxville insists this is the last of “Jackass,” but he’s declared it over before. He’s as repetitive as the franchise’s crotch-smashing obsession. A musical cue near the end of “Best and Last” may indicate more sincere intentions: the wartime warble “We’ll Meet Again” is heard as Knoxville et al continue to bring the pain for showbiz gain. 🌛