Making a smart movie about dumb characters is no easy business. Overplay their dim-wittedness and the characters become unlikable. Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure has always, for me, threaded that needle very skillfully, to deliver an endearing comedy about a pair of lovable doofuses. In this week’s Film at 11 podcast, I take one of my sons on a most bodacious journey through time and space to see whether (or how much) he’d agree with that opinion.
I regret to say that Joseph wasn’t entirely on board with this one. I think he had trouble relating to the characters or the 1980s cultural references. Nevertheless, we had a good discussion in which I make the argument that the movie is actually more clever than it appears at first, and has some very positive messages just as relevant today as ever.
| Title: | Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure |
| Year of Release: | 1989 |
| Director: | Stephen Herek |
| Watched On: | 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray |
| Also Available On: | Blu-ray MGM+ PlutoTV Tubi Various VOD rental and purchase platforms |
The 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray
Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure has had many releases on the Blu-ray format, first from Twentieth Century Fox in 2012 and then licensed by Shout! Factory starting in 2016. The latter disc was eventually repackaged into Double Feature and 3-Film Collection sets with its sequels, as well as a 30th Anniversary SteelBook that arrived a year early in 2018. (Some time travel hijinks must account for that one.)
In 2020, the film was upgraded to 4K Ultra HD by StudioCanal in Europe. Shout! Factory then in turn licensed the StudioCanal master for an American 4K release, sold either on its own or as part of a Bill & Ted’s Most Triumphant Trilogy box set.
I’m not really enthused by the StudioCanal master. The 2.35:1 image is acceptably sharp with a light texture of film grain, but hardly remarkable in terms of detail. Most disappointingly, the contrast and colors are both very flat. Black levels appear slightly elevated, and the HDR grade has no particular highlights of note. Even the glowing electrical effects during the time travel sequences lack any sense of vibrancy or visual pop.
The movie has a number of dupey-looking optical composites by nature of the visual effects technology available in 1989, and some of them are littered with dirt in the frame. I don’t necessarily hold that against the video transfer (though I’m sure the dirt could have been digitally touched-up pretty easily). However, I also don’t see much benefit in the 4K edition of this film over the comparable Blu-ray. It’s watchable enough, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to upgrade if I’d already owned a Blu-ray copy.
[Note that my projector is not compatible with Dolby Vision, just standard HDR10. Perhaps that would help if I ever felt it a worthwhile tradeoff to downgrade to a significantly smaller screen. Don’t bet on that ever happening.]
The movie’s soundtrack is offered in DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 or 5.1 options. For this viewing, I focused on the 5.1 mix, which is quite directional and has some mild bass at times, but is fairly dull-sounding on the whole.
Bonus features on the 4K disc include two audio commentaries (one by star Alex Winter and producer Scott Kroopf, the other by writers Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon), a very good hour-long retrospective documentary, and a trailer. The Blu-ray in the case adds a pretty interesting 20-minute interview with the writers and a painfully jokey 15-minute faux-documentary about the “historical personages” Bill & Ted visit (some of whom didn’t make the final cut).
Related
- Bill & Ted franchise
- Keanu Reeves (star)
- Ed Solomon (writer)
- Time Travel Adventure
- Other Awesome Movies of 1989
Note: All screenshots on this page were taken from the standard Blu-ray edition of the film and are used for illustration purposes only.
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