Roughly three decades after their last adventure, the now middle-aged Bill S. Preston Esq. (Alex Winter) and "Ted" Theodore Logan (Keanu Reeves) have returned. They still haven't written the song that was supposed to bring world peace, and have seen their fortunes plummet. While they're still married to their beloved princesses, Elizabeth (Erinn Hayes) and Joanna (Jayma Mays), and adored by their grown daughters, Billie (Brigette Lundy-Paine) and Thea (Samara Weaving), their lives are on the rocks. And it turns out that their failure has even more serious consequences. The fabric of reality is starting to unravel, prompting Rufus's daughter Kelly (Kristen Schaal) to pay them a visit from the future.
At long, long last, the third "Bill & Ted" movie has arrived. It is utterly predictable every step of the way, and filled with callbacks and recycled bits from the first two movies, but makes a good case for its necessity. Most of the movie is split between Bill & Ted visiting future versions of themselves, trying to get a copy of the song that they've spent the last thirty years trying to write, and their music-loving daughters, who borrow a time machine from Kelly to go put together a band from the greatest musicians who ever existed. Along the way they reunite with Death (William Sadler), meet a robot named Dennis (Anthony Carrigan), and encounter many, many historical figures. And this is all fun, but the big rock concert ending to save the universe is what makes it really worth the journey.
"Face the Music" figures out just the right balance between being a loving, nostalgic homage to its predecessors, and actually functioning as a third chapter of the "Bill & Ted" story. Writers Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon, and director Dean Parisot don't attempt to modernize the characters or update the universe, except to accommodate a clearly limited budget. Instead, the humor and the attitude are remarkably unchanged. This is a goofy, silly, off-the-wall comic romp that wants to make its audience happy. It's still PG rated, doesn't make a lick of sense, and its outlook is as hokey as anything. A big part of why the film works is because Winter and Reeves still clearly love playing these characters, and do so with gusto. They're older and slower, but still able to do the surfer dude accents, and deliver plenty of simultaneous dialogue with enthusiasm. And their willingness to dress up in ridiculous outfits and prosthetics counts for a lot.
Among the supporting cast, there are many standouts. Weaving and Lundy-Paine as the daughters are exactly what they should be - good natured clones of their dads who get to go off and have their own "Excellent Adventure." It's great to see the return of Ted's dad, Chief Logan (Hal Landon Jr.) and Missy (Amy Stoch) to pay off some long running jokes. Anthony Carrigan is a scene-stealer as the robot assassin, and Jillian Bell as a frazzled marriage counselor had some great moments. And despite a few more lines on his face, I swear William Sadler hasn't aged a day since "Bogus Journey." I desperately wanted more of his Death in the movie, as he's a major highlight and doesn't show up in "Face the Music" until pretty late.
I have a few minor nitpicks. Even for a "Bill & Ted" movie, "Face is Music" is very short, running about eighty minutes before the credits. The soundtrack, while most triumphant, doesn't quite have the oomph of the prior ones. Then there's the production design, which uses a combination of CGI and practical effects that never look quite consistent. You can tell exactly where all the money went, and where the production had to cut corners. Still, I appreciate the effort to try and replicate some of the '80s style effects, especially where the famous phone booth is concerned.
They don't get everything right, but the filmmakers nail more than enough to have made the venture worth it. I can't go as far as saying that this is the "Bill & Ted" film that I've been waiting nearly thirty years for, but it is without a doubt a proper "Bill & Ted" film.
So thanks for being excellent to each other, and party on, dudes!
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