Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure
Alex Winter, Keanu Reeves
"Two brain-dead California teenagers, with a combined vocabulary of approximately 75 words, travel back in time to corral various historical figures for a class presentation that just might keep the pair from failing history "most heinously." Napoleon, Socrates, Billy The Kid, Sigmund Freud and Mozart are among those who journey forward in time with the duo in order to give the youth of California eye-witness accounts of the "awesome" pageant that is world history. Most excellent." -amazon.com
We all know this movie. a bizarre movie in concept and a true classic of our generation, Bill and Ted presented us with perhaps one of the greatest buddy movies of all time. That's arguable, of course... the film was despised by most critics and ignored by most people over thirty. For those of us that know, however, there's truly a wonderful film to be found within.
When I smoked and watched, I discovered this: this film was ambitious. it presented the idiot dudes of its audience with their first real brain-food. There was very real science fiction and space/time subject matter. After watching it, admit it, you did some in-depth thinking about time travel. I'd done some before, but this movie opened doors for us all.
Alternately, it enlightened the history we've all known about when we learned that- gasp- old masters of art and thought could have fun. I laughed and clapped when I saw Napoleon enjoy himself so thoroughly at the waterpark. It blew me away- "one the greatest warlords in all of history is just having a great time sliding down water-slicked tubes!". Taking the load off of respect for antiquity just led to incredible fun for me as I watched this movie.
Other tidbits that occurred to me:
-Joan of Arc took charge of the mall excercisers because it looked like they were training for a war. Joan thought "I can train them better than that" and went to work.
-A baseball bat really WOULD be an optimal club for a warlord of ancient times.
-Socrates' speech to his students in greece could be used as a metaphor for time travel.
-Missy, Bill's stepmom, we approximated at about 20 years old.
-Rufus could have really screwed with history. Man oh man.
-Keanu Reeves will probably never think to himself that besides his crappy "serious" acting and music... that he's part of one of the greatest comic duos of all time. Seriously.
GRADE: B+
Thought-provoking??? yes.