“Bill & Ted Face the Music” was directed by Dean Parisot and stars Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter in their most excellent roles. In this film, Bill and Ted are middle aged dads still trying to write the song to save the world while also trying to reconnect with their wives and daughters. I’ve been an avid fan of the first two “Bill & Ted” movies ever since I first saw them; they were both lighting in a bottle. The concept that two idiotic surfer dudes with an extensive vocabulary are destined to save the world through a single song sounds ludicrous, but the first two movies sold it with clever comedy. So naturally, I had a lot of anticipation for this movie.
The best thing about the film is the chemistry between Reeves and Winter. Even though it has been thirty years since the first film, their friendship is as strong as it has ever been. I can’t possibly imagine anyone else in these roles, and that is very rare for me to say. Besides them, most of the other actors were decent. The recurring characters like Death didn’t have as much screen time as I wish they would, but they were still enjoyable in their roles. A risk this movie took was introducing the daughters of Bill and Ted, but I think it paid off for the most part. The characters were likeable and worked well with their fathers. Samara Weaving played Bill’s daughter and she did a satisfactory job at encapsulating him, but the other actress, Brigette Lundy-Paine, was absolutely flawless in the role as Ted’s daughter. She is exactly like young Keanu Reeves from the first two movies. She had the exact same mannerisms as him, even simple ones like the way he turns his head.
Another positive is just that the film is so much fun. Seeing these two characters get out of bogus situations always leads to a good time. The Bill & Ted Franchise almost has that old Disney-like quality to it because the movies have a feeling of pure joy. Also, the film is really funny. There are too many Adam Sandler movies (he has made some great ones in the past) and unfunny remakes nowadays, so it is refreshing to see a legitimately funny comedy.
I don’t really have many significant gripes with the film, but I do have little nitpicks about some of the film’s logic. There was a Robot character in the film that I found incredibly annoying and he kept weighing some of the movie down for me. Fortunately, the character wasn’t in many scenes. The last ten minutes were when problems arose for me. Without spoiling anything, I will say that the ending undermined the original movies because it made Bill and Ted’s three adventures seem meaningless. The ending was also extremely abrupt, and I hate abrupt endings. I don’t need a Lord of the Rings forty-minute-long type of ending, but there needs to be a decent amount of closure. This film just ended with a single voice over line and a cut-to-black. To sum up the ending, Preston/Logan > Wyld Stallyns.
I recommend this movie because of how entertaining and fun it was, and we need movies like this in these tough times. Although the final act left a sour taste in my mouth, I enjoyed the film overall.
Be excellent to each other.
Grade: B+