Jackass: The Movie

FILM REVIEW: forty-eight (how not to make a film in 2 days) (2004)

“Wait.  I got a Wookiee in my office.” – Dan Narvali, forty-eight.

forty-eight (how not to make a film in 2 days) (2004 independant film)

By Matt Head and Adam Skinner

It’s hard to believe that the early 2000s were so long ago! Get ready to feel old:  they were!  The short film called forty-eight by local Kitchener filmmakers Matt Head and Adam Skinner sure proves that time has elapsed.  Witness:  the goth-emo-punk clothes, the ear tunnels, and a sense of humour that was on point for 2004, but terribly dated by 2024.

Skinner and Head originated in a local “Jackass” style comedy group called Me6.  In the wild wild days before YouTube, these guys were buying used Blockbuster uniforms and filming themselves whilst pretending to work at the hallowed video rental establishment.  Me6 would hit each other in the head with frying pans.  What they did wasn’t subtle or original, but it was local.  Given that Jackass was one of the biggest franchises in the world, fans were seeking more of that style of stunt comedy online.  Me6 were on the pulse during an age when the internet was not yet saturated.  All they really needed was some originality.

Forty-eight is very original.  It is an 18 minute film, and the project that showed what Skinner and Head were capable of doing themselves.

Matt and Adam play fictional versions of themselves.  At breakfast one morning, Adam spies an ad for a film festival in two days.  Matt is skeptical that they can come up with a movie in just 48 hours, but suddenly has an idea:  a summetime fun movie!  The only problem is it’s February.  The project is abandoned in favour of a supposedly better one.  Seeking funding from a local lawyer named Dan Narvali, the pair secure $71.50 to do another film idea:  Dan Narvali’s Killer in the Basement.  Actors and a crew are hired, and things immediately deteriorate.  Blame falls directly upon the disorganized shoulders of Skinner and Head.  Everyone quits.  Dan Narvali’s Killer in the Basement is changed to Baseball Dog, which fails to launch, and changes to a fantasy film.  The high fantasy changes to Sexparty, then a war movie, and finally to Ghosts With Guns.  Strife within the crew, and everyone constantly trying to get the only female cast member to take her top off, causes everything to crash to a halt.  Will the duo ever get a movie made in time for the festival?

The humour is largely crude, relying on gay slurs and sexual harassment jokes.  One always must remember the time in which a movie was created.  Compared to any other vulgar comedy in 2004, this is on par.  There are also things that are objectively funny, such as trying to make a fantasy film called Quest for the Crown starring a girl wearing a snake suit while wielding a rifle.  There’s also a genuine moment of laughter when one actor falls down a snowy hill yelling, “We’re gonna take the crown!  Cover me Serpentina!”  The performances are spot-on, spontaneous and big time.  These are funny actors.

The DVD comes with deleted scenes, gag reel, stills, and an informative audio commentary track by Skinner and Head.

As a product of its time, forty-eight is a serious accomplishment for independent filmmakers.  The movie really was made in just two days.  However, the cringe factor today ranges from uncomfortable to gross.

3.5/5 stars

 

 

#974: I Was a Bit of a Jackass

RECORD STORE TALES #974: I Was a Bit of a Jackass

Part of my process, after breaking up with Radio Station Girl in 2003, was simply to explore new things.  Music, piercings, and movies.  Moving on, adapting, becoming a new me, and resurrecting parts of my old self as well.  The immature inner child that persists.  As kids, we weren’t bad boys, but we did get into mischief and play pranks.  I always felt that if we had access to a video camera back then, we could have been Tom Green before there was a Tom Green.  But we didn’t, and Tom Green was the real pioneer in that regard.  And he took things way further than we did.  Still, Green reminded me of me when I was younger.

It’s not a controversial statement to say that Jackass, particularly Bam Margera, owe a debt to Tom Green.  Green was pranking his parents before Margera was on MTV doing the same.  Where Green did it with a coy faux innocence, Margera’s version of the same was with manic violence.  Jackass turned everything up several notches.  As soon as a copy of Jackass: The Movie entered the store where I worked on used DVD, I grabbed one.  I was curious.

Soon I was hooked!

I could remember taking shopping carts for a ride when I was teenager.  Early teenager.  When Bob started working at the grocery store, he told me “Do you know how much those carts cost?  $1000 each.  So from now on we return them.”  Before that though…yes, we sure did give them a spin in parking lots.  Parking lots were empty on Sundays and you could do just about anything.  We never took serious tumbles like Johnny Knoxville and crew, but we did race them around a bit.  I could live vicariously through Bam, Steve-O, Knoxville, Ryan, Ehren, Dave, Pontius, Preston and Wee Man.  They could do the things I thought were funny but would never do myself!  I killed myself laughing when Johnny rented and destroyed the car at the smash-up derby, then refused to pay for the damage.  Just the absurdity of it all.  You know that everybody signed waivers and got MTV reimbursements after the fact, so all’s even-steven in the end.  In other words it’s OK to laugh.

Another reason I dove hard into Jackass:  girls that I thought were pretty cute seemed to really like them (especially Bam).  So if I was into Jackass, that was something I had in common with the cute punk and goth girls I liked.  I also took style pointers from the guys.  I had piercings and a couple tattoos, and I had one photo with curly blond hair that I thought looked just enough like Ryan Dunn.  I bought wristbands and shirts at Hot Topic and skate shops.  I dyed my hair frequently.  I looked the part.

Visiting my parents regularly was something I really enjoyed doing after moving out and getting my own place.  I liked to watch movies with them.  Rather, I enjoyed making them watch things of my choosing.  And so it happens that I tricked them into watching Jackass: The Movie with me.

They liked documentaries, so I told them that “Jackass is a documentary about stuntmen.”

I just re-watched the movie recently to refresh my memory for this story.  Calling it a documentary was a bit of a stretch, but calling it a documentary about stuntmen was really pushing it.  There are stunts, yes, but there was also poo, pee, puke, and bottle rockets firing out of Steve-O’s anus.

My mother was not impressed.  “I hated it!  I don’t like crude things,” she insists.

Jackass was indeed crude, with the climax being a prank involving Dunn sticking a toy car up his ass and then getting a hilarious reaction from an X-ray doctor.

“That kind of humour to me is not very intelligent,” says my mom, correctly.  It’s fact it’s quite anti-intelligent.  But that can also be escapism.  My mom didn’t see it that way.

I asked her which sketch she thought was the worst.  “The only one I can remember is the guy pooping in the toilet.”

Ah yes!  Dave England walked into a hardware store with a newspaper in hand, sat on one of the display toilets, and took a dump right there.  This is funny?  My mom didn’t think so.  But as kids, when we were dragged out into hardware stores by parents for (seemingly) hours on end, did we not sit on those toilets making farting sounds?  I bet we did.

That’s the side of me that Jackass appealed to.  The inner child, the immature side that still laughs when someone farts in a movie.  That’s OK.  What makes you laugh could be very different and that’s OK too!  I needed to get back to that a little bit, and rediscover my childish side after having my heart crushed by a Radio Station Girl.

Just don’t share this side with your parents.  Trust me, they won’t get it!