‘I am the great Cornholio. I need T.P. for my bunghole…’
I watched Beavis and Butt-Head Do America sometime around 1998 once it was available for rental in the UK. I think, along with the first Austin Powers movie and the work of Adam Sandler, it was pretty much the funniest thing my young mind had ever encountered up until that point. Revisiting beloved films from the past is always fraught with danger but returning to a comedy contains additional potential for disappointment. Is it possible to find something funny when you are ten years old and then again when you’re staring forty in the face? Well, dear reader, I’m pleased to confirm that the phrase “Give me T.P. for my bunghole” will never not be funny. Thank heavens for that…
Based on the iconic MTV cartoon Beavis and Butt-Head (created by Mike Judge who also voices both characters), Beavis and Butt-Head Do America sees our intrepid duo travelling across America on a quest to score. After their TV is stolen, the boys find themselves wrapped up in a murder plot that sees a drunken maniac (voiced by Bruce Willis) mistakenly hiring Beavis and indeed Butt-Head to ‘do’ his ex-wife (Demi Moore). This leads to a series of hilarious misunderstandings and lots of jacking off in an old man’s motorhome.
Moore and Willis, a married couple at the time, have a blast voicing two underworld kingpins, but it is Robert Stack as cavity-search-obsessed FBI Agent Flemming who steals the show. While the inane adolescent humour of the titular duo is always funny, it is the scenes involving Flemming that really sing. Judge brings back some old favourites from the cartoon (Mr. Van Driessen, Principal McVicker) but it is the new characters that ensure that …Do America never feels like an extended episode of the TV show. Instead, this first Beavis and Butt-Head movie feels like a self-contained story. You could watch this film having never seen a single second of the source material and still find plenty to enjoy.
Beavis and Butt-Head was always intelligent comedy disguised as low-brow stoner humour and …Do America is probably the characters’ finest hour. About as good as a film about two teenage morons could possibly be.
