Be still, our dumb teenage hearts, for the Jackass team has decided that it is that special time for us to see them do things we shouldn’t try at home once more. Paramount and MTV Films announced (via The Hollywood Reporter) that they have already completed shooting on Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa, a film based on Johnny Knoxville’s elderly Iriving Zisman character.
Zisman, as you might recall from the previous three Jackass films (okay, 3.5 if you count the straight-to-DVD special) and from the MTV show was an elderly man unleashed on the unsuspecting public with his shocking, gross antics. These included and were not limited to: defecating in the street and pretending he didn’t know where he was, hitting on college girls, popping wheelies in his Hoveround, and if I recall correctly, a truly terrible moment where a dog stole his prosthetic leg, much to the horror of onlookers.
He got away with this because he was just Knoxville in (very poor) age makeup and some high-waisted khaki pants. It just seems strange that the Jackass guys chose to focus an entire film on this specific character, which was never even that popular, rather than go their normal “staple genitalia to a 2×4” route. It’s a solid formula that has tested true in the box office – enough to get this fourth film greenlit.
But Paramount apparently has so much faith in Bad Grandpa that they’re willing to give it an October 25th release date, the spot usually reserved for the Paranormal Activity franchise. Paranormal Activity: Spin-Off Edition will now be released on January 3, 2014, with studio executives citing the success of the January 2012 release of The Devil Inside. This will mark the first Halloween in four years that a Paranormal Activity film has not been in theaters.
Knoxville, what hath you wrought?
