If you have seen MTV's 'Jackass' on television, then you will know exactly what you're in for with 'Jackass: the Movie'. The biggest surprise is just how little the original format has been changed in its transition to the big screen.

There is still the same bunch of degenerate skateboys, led by Johnny Knoxville, occasionally assisted by their game celebrity pals (tattooed hardman of rock Henry Rollins, postmodern director Spike Jonze, skating legend Tony Hawk). There is still the same episodic combination of juvenile pranks and masochistic stunts. There is still the same homosocial cameraderie, perhaps explaining why so many of their dares end in eye-watering pain being focussed specifically on the balls, the 'butthole', or the space in between (for which they even have an affectionate nickname, 'the gooch').

The only real differences are its full feature length, its elaborately devised set-pieces at beginning and end that frame the otherwise makeshift proceedings, and its slightly expanded budget (allowing the crew to try out their Dom Joly-style antics in Tokyo, and to destroy more property than usual). There is also much more vomit, urine, shit and honest-to-goodness pain than could ever be shown on TV.

'Jackass: the Movie' has all the sensibilities of a live-action 'Beavis and Butthead', but with less subtlety and no satire. Knoxville and co. are a bunch of adult males who have forgotten to grow up, and who offer you the opportunity to laugh along with them and feel like a part of their close-knit gang, without yourself having to endure their hazing highjinks and dangerous rites of bonding/bondage.

If you think of yourself as above this kind of puerile inanity, then you may find this film very confronting indeed. For try as you might to sneer at Knoxville's nipples being clamped by the jaws of a baby alligator, frown upon Ryan Dunn having 'the shit kicked out of [him] by a girl', or disapprove of Steve-O snorting wasabi up his nose, you will eventually - irresistibly - find yourself roaring with laughter at their self-inflicted torments. My personal breaking point was the all-too-brief sight of Jason 'Wee Man' Acuna kicking himself in the head. And once this film has managed to get you guffawing, it's too late. You have been put in touch with your inner frat-boy, and there is no going back.

Painfully hilarious for teenage boys and ex-teenage boys. Pointless for anyone else.

Anton Bitel, 2.3.3