Well guess what, most of the Ernest movies are pretty good and some of them are really good.
A couple are a little embarrassing but that's ok.
There are like 4 to 4 and a half real ones that actually came out in the movie theatre and had some effort put into them, the rest of them mostly just went straight to dvd I guess I don't know the whole history. I'm just gonna go from memory and I guess this will be in order.
This is just my personal list, feel free to share your own. If you disagree maybe you can change my mind.
I'm not really counting the tv shows or specials or any of that extra stuff, but as an added bonus I'll get into them after.
Some of these are available to watch in full online and some of them aren't. I'll link to everything that is so you can get caught up.
NUMBER ONE:
Ernest Goes to Camp.
While Ernest Goes to Camp might not technically be my absolute favorite of the Ernest movies, I put it at number one because it's technically the first one that came out at the theaters. Its actually one of the first movies I ever remember seeing at the theaters.
There are a couple celebrities in the mix as well such as:
Lyle Alzado who was kind of a big thing at some point i think.
as well as that dude who was in "Mi Vida Loca" and played Selena's brother in the movie. He was also in this movie I used to like called "Gas Food Lodging" by the same director that I saw late at night on HBO when I was a little kid. He's been in a lot of stuff thats all I can think of off the top of my head. Oh yeah he was in "Traffic."
He was a little kid in this.
I remember there was some dude staying with us at my families house and we all went to see this and he decided not to come watch this with us but to go see "Down and Out in Beverly Hills" instead probably because he's one of those people who think an Ernest movie is stupid and can't appreciate that its just dumb and funny. I've watched "Down and Out in Beverly Hills" as a grownup and it actually fucking sucks and he probably would have liked Ernest Goes to Camp way more.
Well fuck him its a good movie and you should watch it and give Ernest a chance.
Number Two:
Ernest Scared Stupid
This is probably actually my favorite of all the movies but gets number two due to sentimental value of Ernest Goes to Camp.
This is probably the one that people who wouldn't want to watch an Ernest movie would like the most.
I just realized re-watching this a few weeks ago that the trolls in this movie look a whole lot like some of the trolls from Troll 2
Ernest Scared Stupid came out about a year after Troll 2 so I wonder if maybe they reused some of these troll masks or if somebody from Troll 2 worked on Ernest Scared Stupid. Also like why would an Ernest movie just randomly be trolls and not some other kind of monster or something. idk maybe they're connected somehow. Maybe someday I'll do a deep imdb search of who worked on both movies. Or maybe somebody can answer this for me.
I remember there was this dude at my church who used to pass out Jesus tracts with my parents and this one day for some reason he took me to this movie.
I don't know how old he was or what but he seemed fine.
We went to a toy store or something after that and I think I got him to buy me a wrestling action figure or not sure maybe if maybe I was still into G.I. Joe's at that time, but I remember him saying to me these exact words, "I just wanna buy things for you."
At the time I was like "hell yeah" but looking back I thought that was kind of weird.
Also I think there was some weird thing that happened with him shaking my younger brother or something like that and he didn't come to our house anymore.
Number Three:
Ernest Saves Christmas
"Ernest Saves Christmas" is actually the highest grossing of all the Ernest movies and for me its right up there with some of the other classics like Home Alone, National Lampoons Whatever the Christmas One is Called, and Whatever Other Movies I Like Watching During Christmas.
There's a lot going on in this movie besides Ernest, a lot of other characters doing stuff. It seemed like maybe it had the highest budget of all the movies.
Also my parents made a big deal out of how in the beginning Ernest is driving a taxi and he has a bumper sticker on his dash board that says "Keep Christ in Christmas."
I remember when we went to see this at the theatre we ended up getting there like halfway through so we missed a chunk at the beginning and my parents were just like screw it and we stayed and watched the next showing too and nobody seemed to have a problem with it.
I used to own this movie on dvd until the infamous "Ernestgate" of I think 2011 when I had a birthday party at Kristen Christians art gallery i forget what it was called and I had an Ernest movie marathon because she could show movies there.
I ended up blacking out and never got my movies back. She eventually blocked me because she asked us to sell band merch and she ended up selling our merch on consignment but she wouldn't give us the money for it. IDK its a long story i guess but the point is hey, if you see this movie on dvd for cheap anywhere can you get it for me?
This ones on youtube.
Number Four:
Ernest Goes to Jail
I don't have any particular fun stories that I can think of for this one, I just remember being so pumped when the trailer for this came on tv. And I got to see it. There were a lot of movies that I was pumped about when I was a kid and the nice thing about the Ernest movies was there want anything bad in any of them so I was excited about them and it usually worked out that I could go see them int he theatre because my parents liked them to.
I know I don't have as much to say about Ernest Goes to Jail but its just as good as the other ones.
Now those are the big four of the Ernest series. Those ones all were in the movie theaters and had commercials on tv and billboards and advertising and everyone knew they were coming out and everyone was excited about them and everyone who was smart went to see them at the theater and Ernest was a big deal all over the world.
But then I don't know what happened which leads me to:
Number Five:
Ernest Rides Again
This one was weird because I remember seeing commercials for it and wanting to see it and it never really seemed to come out in the theater or if it did it was for like a week.
Don't let that shitty trailer fool you, this one was still kind of working with a normal, if a little lesser, movie budget.
Its still pretty good I like it ok, but mostly because Ernest is still in top form, he just didn't have the material to work with that he did in some of the other movies.
It should be noted that at some point towards the end of the first four Ernest stops saying, "Hey, Vern."
What happened to Vern?
I guess people were just kind of getting over Ernest at this point. This was unfortunately the last of the Ernest movies to be released theatrically.
Fun Fact:
Ernest Rides Again features a cameo from Howard Stern "wack pack" member, the recently diseased Eric the Midget/ Eric the Actor
Number Six:
Dr. Otto and the Riddle of the Gloom Beam
Now this movie definitely scared the shit out of me when I was a kid. The movie basically starts out with Ernest getting killed.
It's weird this is the first movie the people behind the Ernest movies ever made.
Ernest got pretty popular off doing a bunch of dumb commercials, so popular in fact that he got to be in big multimillion dollar movies, but then the first movie he ever makes barely has Ernest in it and its super weird and theres stuff in it thats pretty much completely inappropriate for the audience he's going for. And this would be pretty cool if the movie was good at all. Its pretty bad.
However due to at least the effort they seem to put in and the oddity of it I put it higher up on the list than it deserves mostly just because it left a big impression on me.
It was one of those things you remember seeing when you were a kid and being terrified of it and like twenty years later you're like "was that a real thing that Ernest movie that I was horrified of with like the weird robots and the torture machines and stuff?"
Turns out it is.
Number Seven:
Slam Dunk Ernest
So we're starting to get to the point where the movies suck.
Slam Dunk Ernest is pretty much the last movie before whoevers in charge of making Ernest movies just totally gives up and says fuck it lets get shittier cameras and stop even making scripts for this shit, and write before Ernest gets cancer and can't really walk in his movies.
This one however does have some sentimental value because I bought it on VHS in high school right around the time me and my friends really got into hard partying so we definitely sat in my room drunk/stoned(there was actually a time in my life when I smoked weed like every day all the time and I hated pretty much every second of it, but its actually not that bad if you do it and then just sit on a couch watching Ernest play basketball for hours).
Remember that movie "Like Mike" where the asshole kid gets magic shoes or some shit and becomes a good basketball player and it has Lil Bow Wow or Lil Romeo or whoever it was?
Slam Dunk Ernest is the exact same plot.
Ernests fun afterwork janitor basketball team gets so good because of Ernest that they get to play the Charlotte Hornets.
BUT WOULDNT IT MAKE MORE SENSE FOR THE HORNETS TO JUST DRAFT ERNEST WHY DO THEY NEED TO WASTE THEIR TIME PLAYING THE OTHER SHITTY JANITORS?
It's pretty cool Kareem-Abdul Jabbar was in this movie.
Also heres a weird one, Crispin Glover is in "Like Mike."
Well that last one isn't "Like Mike" but I like his dance.
But seriously Crispin Glovers cool and all but he's been in so many shitty movies, so what was his fucking problem with Back to the Future 2, right?
Back to the Future 2 is a lot better than "Like Mike."
Number Eight:
Ernest Goes to School
This is the first Ernest movie with no theatrical release that went straight to dvd. And to be fair I've maybe watched this once possibly twice or one and a half.
Its got some ok bits. One thing I don't like, which also goes for "Slam Dunk Ernest" is that Ernest gets a girlfriend and its this weird nerd girl and I don't see why he can't just have a normal girlfriend. I guess that sounds bad but I think what I'm saying makes sense if you watch all the movies. Or I can tell you what I'm talking about in person.
Also, this is pretty much the same plot as Billy Madison. Billy Madison is pretty good.
Ernest Goes to School came out first though.
Idk this movie has a couple ok bits in it but lets face it its a big step down. It looks cheaper but Ernest is kind of still trying.
But hey, get this, this is the first movie Will Sasso was ever in! Remember Will Sasso MadTV?
This is probably my favorite MadTV Sketch
Also I like this character
Tie For Last Place:
Ernest Goes to Africa
AND
Ernest in the Army
I didn't really feel the need to make separate entries for these two because basically they both suck. I'm definitely an Ernest completist who for some terrible reason needs to see every Ernest thing and I have a tough time getting through both of these. There seems to just be a huge drop off in effort and quality and of course Ernest in the Army is his last movie and according to the E True Hollywood Story(who remembers) on Jim Varney I saw years ago he could barely walk for Ernest in the Army because he was dying of lung cancer during it.
Ernest goes to Africa has Fela Kuti which is kind of cool but definitely not enough to save it.
I kind of wish he had stopped before these two but I guess somebody thought they could squeeze some more money out of Ernest movies which maybe they did hopefully who knows.
It would have been cool if he went out with a bigger bang than he did thats all.
I guess in the end the bad ones can't bring the good ones down.
The first four are all highly recommended.
If you're really that into them start making your way down the list and see how far you can get.
Trust me, it gets tougher towards the bottom.
Other Mentions:
There's a couple other good Ernest things out in the world.
The main one that some people probably know is that he kind of did his own version of Pee-Wee's Playhouse called "Hey, Vern, It's Ernest."
This show was awesome when I was a kid but unfortunately it's not like Pee Wee where adults can kind of enjoy it too, its pretty much just for kids and doesn't really hold up that great. There are some good bits throughout like I like the Hollywood Sound Effects guy
It's getting a little late so here's just a couple other Ernest things to see:
idk I'm just gonna go to sleep now maybe
No comments:
Post a Comment