Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure/Dirty Rotten Scoundrels/Spaceballs [3 Discs]

Editorial Reviews

By the time Spaceballs rolled around, Mel Brooks' brand of zany slapstick and genre parody had long since begun to wear out its welcome. And by 1987, Star Wars was a positively ancient target for satire. It's no surprise, then, that this collection or hoary puns and cheesy sight gags smelled strongly of mothballs even during its initial run. Despite the assembled talent, from John Candy to John Hurt, writer/director Brooks seems more capable of eliciting groans than laughs with his endless sight gags and pointless running jokes. Joan Rivers is actually a hoot as the voice of robot prude Dot Matrix. But it doesn't say much for the rest of the picture that the best acting -- and funniest jokes -- come from a performer who's heard but never seen. With his royal drag and practically dreadlocked fright wig, Dick Van Patten is worth a laugh or two as the hapless King Roland. Brooks also works in a few decent set pieces and swipes at other sci-fi films. But the puns, from "Druish Princess" to "Pizza the Hut," belong in the warmup monologue of a talk show, not the script of a Hollywood feature. And the jokes are even worse when they fall outside the confines of Mad Magazine-style send-ups. The scene in which the characters watch the video of their own movie to find out what happens next is only one example of the labored hamminess on display. In fact, the only consistently funny element is John Morris's score, which takes deadly aim at the bombast of John Williams -- and scores a direct hit. ~ Brian J. Dillard, Rovi Dirty Rotten Scoundrels harks back to the era of suave 1950s and '60s caper films -- specifically, the 1963 David Niven/Marlon Brando vehicle Bedtime Story, on which Scoundrels's script is based. Michael Caine plays the slicker member of the anti-hero duo with perfect English ease, and Steve Martin is inspired as his gauche American counterpart. Scoundrels features an involved and complicated plot, with as many twists and turns as a decent mystery; the film unfolds like a broad, comic version of the The Sting. Director Frank Oz's only previous adult-oriented film was 1986's Little Shop of Horrors, and with Dirty Rotten Scoundrels he firmly established the fine comic form that he would perfect with In & Out (1997) and Bowfinger (1999). The lush French Riviera environs are adroitly shot by Michael Ballhaus. ~ Matthew Doberman, Rovi This slacker comedy provides some good low-brow laughs and, sadly enough, delivered many teenagers some history lessons when it was released. Keanu Reeves' breakthrough role as the loveable dunce Ted resulted in typecasting that would plague his career until The Matrix. The film aggravated some educators with its frivolous treatment of academia but brought praise from others for making history fun and palatable. It also stamped words like "bogus" and "gnarley" firmly into the '80s slang lexicon. George Carlin's appearance as the time-traveler Rufus adds a little comedic legitimacy to this little film, which essentially boils down to engaging and well-paced silly, mindless fun with a fairly well-written script. The legacy of Bill and Ted can be traced to the slacker comedies of Adam Sandler, and the film itself was popular enough to spawn an ill-fated sequel and a short-lived Saturday morning cartoon. ~ Mike DiBella, Rovi