| If Ernest and his
prepubescent friends don't act soon, Halloween will
be the apocalypse. Armed with Eartha Kitt and milk,
they take on the monsters in assorted comedic ways
that are still damn funny. Thumb your nose down on
this title all you want, but it's hilarious and a
ride I can go on with a shit eating grin and some
memories. 1990's "Ernest Goes to Jail" is the
darker of the trilogy of films where Ernest is
pretty much a Pee Wee Herman clone living in an
elaborate house that garners some gags that aren't
all too funny but pretty indicative of where the
Ernest character was during his inception. In this
more adult film, Ernest is mistaken for a Death Row
inmate and is forced to trade roles with the inmate
during a tour of the prison. While there, Ernest is
thought to be the murderous prisoner and attempts to
escape on more than one occasion. His trip to an
electric chair gives him super powers that allow him
to strike back at his spitting image who is outside
wreaking havoc on Ernest's lush life. "Ernest Goes
to Jail" is a funny and surreal bit of entertainment
and one that may not be all too exciting for the
children who will see the hero who fought trolls in
one movie being electrocuted on a chair in prison
the next moment. The film adheres to Ernest's
typical off the wall comedy, but much of it is too
wonky to enjoy on an innocent level. I still enjoy
it to some degree, but like the others it's not a
masterpiece. 1987's "Ernest Goes to Camp" is
admittedly one of the few Ernest film I've never
seen.
Save for Ernest's
later more dismal comedies, this is the earlier
Ernest adventures I'd never actually sat down to
watch in its entirety and it's surely not the best
of the installments. A light rip off of "Meatballs,"
Ernest is a handyman at a summer camp who garners
the love and respect of a small group of juvenile
delinquent counselors he's tasked with leading in to
summer festivities and a bid for respect, all the
while running afoul a local mining corporation that
has evil plans in store for the beloved camp. Of
course, Ernest saves the day and garners his own
respect in the end. But then he's not one to just
stay at a single location as the world needs Ernest.
The DVD's are all considerably good quality, the sad
fact though it "Camp" has a canned audio to it that
can be distracting, and there is the lack of extras,
but seeing as this is more an archival collection
than a collector's edition, it's fit for your buck.
Ernest was something back in the day and he lives on
through these three bits of nostalgia, each of which
have their own places in the audiences favor and
will be picked exclusively by folks looking to go
along with Ernest to Camp, to Jail, or to save
Halloween. The great Jim Varney is not forgotten. We
now know him by his unfunny more derivative moniker
Larry the Cable Guy, but back in the eighties, he
was Ernest, the original article, the main man who
always won out in the end. KnowhutImean? |
