Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure |
  • USA • 1989 • 90m •    • Directed by: Stephen Herek. • Starring: Keanu Reeves, Alex Winter, George Carlin, Terry Camilleri, Dan Shor, Tony Steedman, Rod Loomis, Al Leong, Jane Wiedlin, Robert V. Barron, Clifford David, Hal Landon Jr., Bernie Casey. • Music by: David Newman.      With only a few days before their high-school graduation, Bill S. Preston, esquire and Ted 'Theodore' Logan are doomed to flunk out of school. The history teacher, Mr. Ryan, decides to give Bill and Ted a chance. If they can ace an oral exam on the topic of how a famous historical personality might react to modern times, they will be allowed to pass. If not, Ted's father will place Ted in military school, thereby disbanding the Wyld Stallyns, the heavy metal band that was formed by Bill and Ted. Bill and Ted get help from an unexpected source: Rufus, an Emissary from the Future. It seems that in Rufus' time, Bill and Ted's music is the basis of all existence, and if the Wild Stallyns are disbanded, Rufus's world will no longer exist. Bill and Ted are whisked off in a time machine to retrieve a few historical characters for their oral exam so they can pass, but Bill and Ted soon discover that finding the historical characters and getting them to the high school won't be easy.
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Review:
While these two excellent dudes are presented and even treated like a unit, they are given individualized home situations and slightly different personalities. Ted (Keanu Reeves) is a bit more cheerful and goofy than Bill (Alex Winter), who has a few moments of irritation. While academically incompetent, they actually have some pretty good ideas and moments of resourcefulness throughout, rather like Harry and Lloyd in Dumb and Dumber. The whole time, they surf speak (e.g. "Excellent," "Triumphant," "Bodacious," etc.) and play air guitar solos as they collect their historical figures. These small quirks are what I feel makes this movie so enjoyable.
Of course, it isn't award winning in any regard. As mentioned before, the story is given very little thought. The scattered moments of sci-fi have pretty poor visual effects. Of course, it is a comedy so these technical aspects are not terribly important. Besides, the acting and scripting is satisfactory from the main characters, minor characters, and one- liner parts.
The comedy has a consistent personality and mood to it, but there is a pretty good balance of situational and verbal humor. The comedy is presented blatantly and doesn't have much Home Alone style slapstick or Monty Python style British humor. The back half of the movie has lots of gags involving eight historical figures being put in California in the 80's. Bill and Ted have some pretty funny lines, but it's also quite amusing to just watch their non-verbal reactions to various situations. The humor is family friendly, though not written like a kid's movie. If that is confusing, it's essentially Wayne's World style comedy on a PG level, but again it isn't a kid's movie.
You can watch this in almost any setting and not decrease the viewing experience. There's no problem if you watch it with a semi-boisterous crowd. If you don't find it funny or enjoyable after ten or so minutes, I would recommend turning it off. Your first impression of this film will probably be close to your opinion of it at the end. So in short, it's worth a try in search of a good comedy, but is by no means a masterpiece.
Review by Evan Wessman (CinematicInceptions) from the Internet Movie Database.
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