BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD DO AMERICA
A film review by Serdar Yegulalp
Copyright 1997 Serdar Yegulalp
CAPSULE: Huh huh huh. Heh hmh hmh. If you're not already snickering at the prospects, this probably isn't the movie for you, but there are many, many laugh-out-loud moments.
First, a confession: Beavis and Butt-head, those neo-Chaucerian Harlequins of MTV, make me laugh. They're absolutely on target. We've seen their kind before, in the backs of every classroom we've ever had to waste our lives in, behind convenience stores and maybe even in our own homes. (Jeez, I hope not.)
"Beavis and Butt-head Do America" takes the basic premises of the censor-infuriating TV series, stretches them to movie-size, lights the fuse, and gets the heck out of there, leaving us to enjoy the blast wave as it slams our tuchis to the ground. It's not the funniest movie ever made, but it's amusing for most of the time and there are moments where I laughed harder than anything in recent memory. (One of the best jokes involves a running gag about cavity searches -- just so you know what to expect.)
The plot, what little there is of it, is a gag on which to hang an endless series of complications -- most of them centering around the Dimwit Duo's infallible stupidity. The movie opens with their TV being stolen, and the way this is introduced to the audience and then the protags (dare we call them that?) is a little masterpiece of timing.
The two hit the streets to find their TV, and in the process get embroiled in a very strange plot to go kill someone for money. The way in which their instructions are misinterpreted gets one good laugh after another -- leading to a great mini-punchline when the woman who is to be killed offers them even more money to go back and kill their employer. (I am treading carefully here to avoid ruining anything.) From there they get embroiled in an even weirder plot that centers around a stolen chemical weapon sewn into the seat of Beavis's pants. And so on.
I had (and won, I think) an argument with someone after the movie when they said it was stupid. No, I said -- it's ABOUT stupidity. That's why it's funny: it points out things about them that a less-ambitious movie would never get it in its head to attempt. It's not enough that Beavis and Butt-head are about as repulsive to women as a pair of cold corpses. It's that they try to use stale pick-up lines, and can't even get them straight, or tell dirty jokes and botch the punchlines. In short, it's about an attitude. If Beavis and Butt-head do nothing for you but try your patience, you'll probably get more yuks elsewhere, but my only criterion for whether a comedy works is: Did it make me laugh? Sure, I did.
Two and a half out of four M-80s.
syegul@ix.netcom.com EFNet IRC: GinRei http://serdar.home.ml.org another worldly device...
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