(There are numerous spoilers in the below article and interview. Basically, this is meant to be read after you've seen the movie - which, in case you're wondering, is well worth the 3D admission price. Just wanted to make that clear.)

At this point, the only thing that can stop the JACKASS gang is age - and having seen a thirty-nine year old Johnny Knoxville walk away from a nasty collision with a bull in the 3D third installment, I'm not even sure age can put a stop to their shenanigans. As director Jeff Tremaine told me at Comic Con last July, "These guys are like cockroaches." He means this lovingly, of course. After all, these remarkably resilient rascals have risked life and tattooed limb to ensure each entry in the franchise at the very least matches the juvenile genius of the original movie (and the MTV series which spawned it). Faces have been bloodied, bones busted, and, in what could very well be classified a suicide attempt, Butterbean boxed. What keeps it fun is not so much the abandon, but the inventiveness with which they endanger themselves: anyone moron can stand inside a pen with a ticked-off ram, but only the JACKASS boys would first try to "soothe the savage beast" with music (sputtered tunelessly out of marching band instruments). It's like a Looney Tunes gag brought to life. Since co-creating the show in 2000 with Knoxville and Spike Jonze, Tremaine has seemed to be the adult-ish influence who keeps things from getting too far out of hand. I wouldn't necessarily call him the voice of reason (he did, after all, once shoot Dave England taking a dump in a hardware store display toilet), but he's clearly got a knack for getting the most - visually and physically - out of every stunt. And with this latest film, he gets to show off his visual acumen with the specially-designed Phantom 3D camera. From the spectacular super slo-mo opening sequence to a flying dildo bit that plays like the filthiest Ernie Kovacs gag ever, this is obviously the most... um, art-directed JACKASS movie yet. Tremaine gets amazing stuff out of this very expensive camera. He also gets pissed on at one point - something very few directors in the history of cinema can claim. I'm guessing. When I spoke briefly to Tremaine over the phone during last weekend's press day, I wanted more than anything to praise him for having crafted the most emotionally stirring trilogy of films since Kieslowski's TROIS COULEURS. I actually kind of mean that. There have certainly been better, more refined comedies over the years, but none have made me laugh as hard from start to finish as the JACKASS movies. They succeed ecstatically on their own terms - and, most importantly, are never mean-spirited. Everyone gets as good as they give in the world of JACKASS. This is the way life is supposed to work.

Mr. Beaks: When you do press events like this, is there a cease fire in place?

Tremaine: There's no formal cease fire, but nothing very dramatic has happened yet. There's going to be something coming. Pontius is probably going to say some pretty untoward stuff at some point. But there's no formal cease fire. Anything can happen at any point.

Beaks: I just wondered if you guys need to have one every now and then.

Tremaine: No. I mean, everyone's nerves are pretty shot right now. We're trying to run the victory lap. But in the same sense, I never feel totally safe. It takes about four years to recover from a JACKASS movie.

Beaks: At which point you're starting to make the next one.

Tremaine: Yeah.

Beaks: It seems like this film has a sense of finality to it. There's a real sentimental vibe to the end credits. Even the opening puts things in a nostalgic perspective. I really like that we have JACKASS and BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD together. The two MTV shows that caused the most trouble.

Tremaine: We've been pretty close to Mike Judge for a while. He's awesome. So when we found out that he was willing to do a BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD [segment] for us, we were so excited. That came really late into the game. But it's a perfect fit.

Beaks: Was Mike someone you could go to when you were having trouble with crusading parents' groups back in the day?

Tremaine: We didn't really know him then, but we've commiserated over certain things. He's just awesome. I'm a big fan of Mike Judge.

Beaks: While watching these movies, I'm always trying to figure out which stunt might've done the most physical damage. It seems like "Ram Jam" would've taken a long time to recover from.

Tremaine: (Laughs) Although I'll take the ram over the buffalo or the bull, just on scale. But that ram was a movie star. That guy wanted to work. You know, it is fun to cut an animal loose that just wants to kill you. They never get an easy chance, so it's so satisfying for those animals. I know bulls are dying to catch and crush people. So to have a guy willing to stand out there and take it, that's got to feel pretty good for the bull.

Beaks: In planning the film, did you have to think in terms of what would work best in 3D as opposed to your normal shenanigans?

Tremaine: I'd say that it was more important for us that it's funny in 2D. The 3D would just be the frosting on the cake. That's how we went into it. You know, we were reluctant to shoot it in 3D just because we didn't want to change how we do things. We definitely shot a few ideas just to play with the 3D, and to see what kind of stupid stuff we could do in front of the most advanced and expensive equipment there is. We custom built a Phantom 3D camera, and that's probably the most expensive 3D camera ever built. And the first thing we shot with it is "Wiener Baseball", where Pontius is hitting ping-pong balls being pitched by Knoxville off his wiener, and Bam's trying to catch them in his mouth.

Beaks: (Laughing) How many hours did it take to get that right?

Tremaine: It's funny because Pontius is really terrible with a real baseball bat. He doesn't do traditional sports. But he was really good at hitting it with his wiener. He hits it almost every time. He hits it a lot.

Beaks: That's impressive. It's a skill no one hones.

Tremaine: You're exactly right. And most of us don't have bats that'll work for that.

Beaks: That's too, true. So were there any stunts on this film where you thought, "If we're going to get someone seriously injured, this is the one"?

Tremaine: It's very stressful shooting a JACKASS movie. One aspect is the danger of the stunts: it's very real. I try to never take it for granted. But on this one did I feel worse? I think all of the movies have had their moments of pure fear. This one definitely had it. Anytime you're working with big angry bulls or things that have never been done before. We didn't really know how well a jet ski was going to fly out of a pool onto land. That was scary. There was not a lot of precedence out there for what would happen.

Beaks: Do you ever have real stuntmen test some of these things first?

Tremaine: We didn't let anyone test it out first. We did have a stunt guy there to give us some tips. We shot that bit the first time in Bam's parents' pool. It was cool. We got a funny bit out of it. But it wasn't as spectacular as we thought it could be. So we had this stunt guy figure out that the pool needs to be sixty feet long for the jet ski to be going fast enough to do anything cool with it. So we then had to go find someone who was willing to let us shoot in their backyard pool, and the pool had to be sixty feet - which is very large for a backyard pool. And then we had to find one that had a place to go. (Laughs) That house happened to have an empty lot, and he just landed in that.

Beaks: Aside from "Ram Jam", I think my favorite this time was "Electric Avenue".

Tremaine: Yeah, that was another fun one. That was one of those ideas where I thought, "Eh, that might be cool. We'll set it up." The idea started big; it was going to be in an old prison, and we were going to shoot it real elaborately. And then it ended up being, "Oh, fuck it, we'll just shoot it in the office." But I think the 3D on "Electric Avenue" is really cool, the way the little stun guns are floating in the air. That was a fun one.

Beaks: It certainly heightens the sense of peril. And when those guys hit the cattle prods...

Tremaine: Oh, man. Stun guns have the most horrific sound. It's like, "Pop! Pop! Pop!" So the guys were extra terrified going into it.

Beaks: When you're going to torture Bam with snakes, how hard is it to keep that secret?

Tremaine: The main thing we have to keep hidden from him is the snake guy. He knows if he sees David Weathers, who is the guy we always hire because he's sort of reckless with his snakes; he's the guy willing to put dangerous snakes on top of Bam that will bite him. (Laughs) We know that we can't let Bam see David Weathers; if he sees David Weathers, it'll fall apart. But Bam, for some reason, just drops his guard pretty easily. That one we plotted out, but I was surprised by how easily it worked. That had a lot of chance for failure, it being a specific spot that we needed Bam to [fall through].

Beaks: Given that everyone is getting older and that recovery times will be lengthier, how can you do another film?

Tremaine: I've learned to never say "never". We've made each and every one of these as if it was the last. In four years, let's talk again, and we'll see if we don't do another one. I have no idea. But we tried to leave it all on the floor this time. But we also have a ton of ideas we didn't shoot, so it's hard to say. They come real easy to us.

Beaks: I really appreciate what you guys do to your bodies for our enjoyment. So, please, as long as you can recover from it, think about doing one more.

Tremaine: You know, the recovery time is great because there's ten of them. We can take a little longer.

If nothing else, there's an extended JACKASS 3.5 due on DVD this Christmas. But if you're a fan, the theatrical experience of JACKASS 3D should not be missed. Faithfully submitted, Mr. Beaks