Knowhutimean? Hey Vern, It's My Family Album

This video contains some pretty amazing skits. Some are amazingly funny, and some are so amazingly bad that it just makes you shake your head.

The most alarming of the skits is the Corporal Davy Worrell sketch. This is done so well it's downright scary. It's a magnum opus of schizophrenic behavior so real you have to wonder why he didn't wind up in the rubber room next to Jonathan Winters. The "Meanest Man in the World" segment has pretty decent acting. And the string of non-sequiter utterances during the Pops Worrell skit is one for the ages.

Others, in particular the "Billy Boogie" segment, are absolutely dreadful and embarrasing to watch. Trust me, this is why the "FF" button was invented. Even worse than the "Earnest" movies, if you can imagine such a thing.

The production values are pretty awful, but that doesn't really detract. I actually lived very near most of the locations in central Kentucky, like the repro Fort Boonesboro in the Davy Worrell segment. I ran model boats in the creek in the Pops skit, and I have seen the abandoned bus in which Queequeg lives. Talk about a brush with fame!

Even if you think the Ernest movies are stupid, this movie is much more a showcase of Jim Varney's characterization talent. He's got a rubber-band voice and a face that moves in every possible direction, and each scene in this movie takes Ernest's seed of an idea in some really interesting directions. It was really nice seeing a movie where whoever has copyright control over the Ernest character finally said, "Okay Jim, why don't you go nuts," which is basically what happens here: just a string of scenes about Ernest's relatives or ancestors where Jim Varney plays basically everybody. Definitely worth renting on a Friday night.

Back in my single days, my roommates and I had every line memorized from the skit where he portrayed every single character in a frontier standoff between the occupants of a fort and the dreaded "Beige foot"

His true gift was mimicry; in that one skit he portrayed every conceivable war movie stereotype; John Wayne, Walter Brennan, a British officer, an Irish soldier, "Cookie" the fort's cook, and an assortment of others. In one of his later movies, Earnest Goes to Jail, he slips into the roll of Sylvester Stallone and then James Mason w/o missing a beat. He just had an amazing gift. The sad part is most people just think of him as the bumbling kid movie star

We'll miss you big guy....

My favorite parts of Ernest movies is when he plays several different characters one after another. This one has the mother of them all with him doing about two dozen different people in a sketch of his relative Davey Worrell. A real knee-slapper as he changes from one guy to another guy without letup. A great watch.

I caught this show by accident the night it aired on television and taped it. It is hilarious, and Jim Varney was at his comedic best. If it is available on video and you are a Jim Varney fan, I highly recommend this one.

Jim Varney plays several characters in this film. Each character has the same goofiness, yet is distinct in very funny ways. I believe this was probably the basis for his 'Vern' characters in his later works. I was sad to see him pass away. Even though I didn't care for the "Earest" series of movies that much, I think this was a reflection on the writers and not the actor.