Ernest Goes to Jail is the third live-action movie produced by Disney to feature the bumbling Ernest P. Worrell character (played by Jim Varney). Opening in February 1990 with no competition, it was the most succesful of the Ernest movies; topping the box office charts and making $17 million in it's opening week end alone.

Plot

Ernest is spotted in a jury (chewing on a leaking ball-point pen!) by a man on trial who notices that he is the spitting-image of a death-row inmate who is the prison "boss". He convinces the jury to tour the prison and Ernest is kidnapped and substituted for the inmate. He has various misadventures in prison before he is electrocuted. The electrocution fails and he is transformed into "Electroman", capable of shooting lightning bolts from his hands. He escapes and makes his way to the bank where he works as a janitor at night, and foils the robbery of the bank by the escaped convict who has assumed his identity in order to gain access to the bank. When Ernest first goes home after escaping, he discovers that his Pee-Wee Herman-like decor has been replaced by a slick lounge lizard style of decorating, wherein he exclaims, "I've been vandalized- by Elvis!". He goes to the bank and takes control of the situation, and uses his super powers to fly through the skylight of the bank with the bomb that the robber has attached to the vault, leading to a spectacular mid-air explosion. Everyone assumes that he has been killed, until he falls through the skylight and declares, "I came, I saw, I got blowed up."

External link

Disney films | 1990 films | Comedy films | Prison films