Jackass: Best and Last: Movie Review

Cast: Johnny Knoxville
Director: Jeff Tremaine

Johnny Knoxville and his band of merry men return for one apparent last gasp as old age catches up to them.

This fifth outing for the Jackass team is supposedly the final one they'll do and blends a little new material with some of the old classics. So how you'll feel about Knoxville and his crew subjecting themselves to both a little indulgence and a lot of pain depends on how much love you've had for the franchise over the years.

2022's Jackass Forever was supposed to be the end of the line for the gang, but it seems the lure of the perennially dumb continues to endure. 

How much you're willing to engage with that will depend largely on how much of an attachment you've had with the initial three series of the MTV show and the continual clips. There's a certain irony that for some elements of the audience, this last outing will be their first cinematic meeting with this group.

However, those expecting a straight up repeat of just a load of newer pranks with older characters enduring them will be disappointed. This final outing - as Knoxville is at pains to repeatedly emphasise in an overly emotional way - is a collection of unaired material, the briefest of talking head interviews and a greatest hits, as well as some newer stunts.

But what transpires in the newer material is how much of it is tied to old age - a robot giving prostate exams, getting lip filler, an inability to pole vault and so on. It's okay material, but as the opening shows with a stunt about Knoxville shooting himself that was banned by MTV, as time has ravaged on, the edges have slowly become softer.

Largely this does feel in parts like it's been rushed through, given how stripped back the newer stunts are - as if they're on a studio Backlot with a minimal budget.

Yet there is an argument to say that in among the wacks to the groin,the showing off of different body shapes  and the desire to hurt friends, one thing that endures in Jackass is the close bond these bunch of troubadors have formed over the years. It's a testament to having a group of male friends and sticking with them.

Even if it does mean taking an unexpected hammer to the bollocks.