Bill and Ted Watch Movies

Bill and Ted discuss Alfonso Cuarón’s 2006 brooding adaption of P.D. James’ 1992 dystopian novel “The Children of Men” where infertility has rendered humanity collectively childless for 18 years pushing the world into a melancholy of despair and hopelessness. Former activist, Theo Faron (Clive Owen), is drawn into a revolutionary plot co-ordinated by a group called ‘The Fishes’ headed by his estranged wife Julian (Julianne Moore) who has come into custody of a young refugee woman with a secret that could disrupt geopolitics and change the course of human history. Cuarón mixes modern photojournalist imagery with innovative long takes and extraordinarily detailed world building designed to produce an immersive viewing experience that delves into spiritual, political and social concerns. Riding the razor’s edge of hope and despair “Children of Men” confronts the value of life and death in the face of demographic winter and looming extinction.

If you enjoyed this film, you may also like these Ted’s Picks: Gattaca (1997), Shoot ‘Em Up (2007), Gravity (2013)

Bill and Ted discuss Mike Judge’s 2006 film “Idiocracy,” the Rip Van Winkle style comedy about an exceptionally average man, Corporal Joe Bauers (Luke Wilson), left to awaken to a future so stupid and idiotic that it boggles the mind five hundred years after a botched one year top-secret military hibernation experiment. The average Joe and his fellow experimental subject Rita (Maya Rudolph) are stunned to discover that he’s easily become the smartest man in America. This alarmingly cutting and prescient cautionary thought experiment satirically delves into the dangers of unchecked consumerism and coperatocracy, the degradation of medicine and law and order, and the dumbing down of politics, popular culture and reportage; Judge provides a politically incorrect, weird, crass, over the top, painfully funny and horrifying film which has now become something of a cult hit.

If you enjoyed this film, you may also like these Ted’s Picks: Sleeper (1973), Encino Man (1992), Don’t Look Up (2021)

Bill and Ted discuss Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s 1947 film adaptation of Margaret Rumer Godden’s 1939 novel “Black Narcissus.” Set in the Himalayas a newly minted mother superior, Sister Clodagh (Deborah Kerr), is sent to the palatial yet rundown former mountaintop harem house of Mo- Poo to establish a convent and open a combination school for girls and pharmacy for local minor medical needs. Both beautiful and brimming with dark obsessions the film delves into physiological and spiritual themes of arrogance and humility against a backdrop of mission-field-culture-shock and extreme isolation with all the temptations and the struggles accompanying a life in which vows of self-sacrifice and poverty have been made and luxury and sensuality is actively denied.

If you enjoyed this film, you may also like these Ted’s Picks: The Red Shoes (1948), The King and I (1956), Silence (2016)

Bill and Ted discuss Martin Campbell’s 1995 James Bond film “GoldenEye” staring Pierce Brosnan as 007. Set after the fall of the Iron Curtain Bond finds himself racing against the Janus Syndicate, a cadre of self-interested villains, to retrieve the access codes for a satellite space weapon named “GoldenEye” that can fire a devastating electromagnetic pulse toward Earth. The very 1990’s “GoldenEye” rounds out Bill and Ted’s ‘golden’ pre-Daniel Craig, pre-modern era James Bond hat trick survey of the franchise. They had previously watched Guy Hamilton’s iconic 1964 film “Goldfinger” and his oddball and juvenile 1974 film “The Man with the Golden Gun.”

If you enjoyed this film, you may also like these Ted’s Picks: Red Dawn (1984), Until the End of the World (1991), The Sum of All Fears (2002)

A quick update about some upcoming changes at Bill and Ted Watch Movies. Hiatus and a big move, plus some technical stuff: if you’re wondering where the film clip is from in the announcement it’s from Alan Metter’s 1988 Richard Pryor comedy “Moving.”

Bill and Ted discuss Joseph Kosinski’s 2010 “TRON Legacy” the action packed follow up to Steven Lisberger’s 1982 groundbreaking sci-fi cult classic TRON. Computer programmer, Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges), long trapped within his own digital creation is forced into action when his son Sam (Garrett Hedlund) surprisingly arrives within The Grid. Together father and son must assist the “isomorphic algorithm” Quorra (Olivia Wilde) as Kevin Flynn’s fallen programme Clu (Jeff Bridges) plots to gain complete control of The Grid and access to the biological world. Less futurist manifesto and more of a contemplative reassessment of digital life Kosinski’s TRON finds its focus digging into relationships both broken and restored. Religious themes of incarnation and forgiveness abound alongside stunning visuals and a pulsing inventive score by the award winning French Electric Dance Music duo Daft Punk.

If you enjoyed this film, you may also like these Ted’s Picks: TRON (1982), Dark City (1998), Oblivion (2013)

Bill and Ted discuss Fritz Lang’s 1927 landmark silent science-fiction drama “Metropolis” where utopia collides with dystopia and the head of the planner desperately needs a mediator for the hand of the worker. Gustav Fröhlich stars as Freder, the privileged son of Johann Fredersen (Alfred Abel), the technocratic designer and overlord of the futuristic city Metropolis who falls in the love with Maria (Brigitte Helm), a kind-hearted woman and the spiritual leader of the workers. Maria and Freder’s dream of a better tomorrow for the whole of Metropolis meets resistance in the face of a mad-scientist bent on revenge. Metropolis is a kind of masterclass blueprint for nearly a century of epic world-building cinema. At every turn there is some archetypical concept, theme, character, visual image, or moment that viewers will recognize from a multitude of films. With its mix of politics, religion, science-fiction, action, futurism, and romance, Lang’s Metropolis is a highly influential film that has left an indelible imprint on generations of film makers.   

If you enjoyed this film, you may also like these Ted’s Picks: Blade Runner (1982), Batman (1989), The Matrix (1999)

Bill and Ted discuss Steven Lisberger’s 1982 boundary pushing Sci-Fi film “TRON,” a futurist film made at the dawn of the personal computer and the explosion of the video game market. Lisberger envisions a world where analogue collides with digital in a struggle over what is real and what is programmed. Jeff Bridges stars as computer programmer Kevin Flynn, who finds himself “incarnated” inside a computer in a struggle against the Master Control Program and his formidable minion Sark (David Warner) as they plot to dominate the real world. Flynn joins the security programme TRON (Bruce Boxleitner) in the fight against the MCP’s tyranny and expanding dystopia. Filled with eye-popping images, this innovative, ambitious, and stylish film took tremendous technical risks unlocking new avenues for the filmmakers that followed.

If you enjoyed this film, you may also like these Ted’s Picks: Metropolis (1927), The Wizard of Oz (1939), The Last Starfighter (1984)

Bill & Ted discuss early silent short films from the dawn of film making: Thomas Edison’s “The Kiss,” (1896); Louis Lumière’s proto cinéma vérité film “The Arrival of the Train,” (1896); Georges Méliès’ iconic Jules-Verne’s-esque sci-fi film “A Trip to the Moon,” (1902); Edwin S. Porter’s Western “The Great Train Robbery,” (1903); D.W. Griffith’s Rom-Com Tragedy “The Making of a Man,” (1911); Charlie Chaplin’s Action Comedy “The Tramp,” (1915); Man Ray’s Experimental film “The Return to Reason,” (1923); and Luis Buñuel’s  Surrealist film with painter Salvador Dali, “Un Chien Andalou,” (1929).  

If you enjoyed this film, you may also like these Ted’s Picks: Robert J. Flaherty’s “Nanook of the North” (1922), Harold Lloyd’s “Safety Last” (1923), Luis Buñuel’s “L’Age D’Or” (1930)

Bill & Ted discuss “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” – John Hughes’ 1986 classic teen comedy. Fast-talking high school senior Ferris Bueller (Matthew Broderick), his neurotic best friend Cameron Frye (Alan Ruck), and carefree girlfriend Sloane Peterson (Mia Sara) put Ferris’ “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it” philosophy into action, ditching school for a whirlwind fun-filled tour of their hometown of Chicago. Narrowly evading Ferris’ kind but clueless parents and suspicious sister Jeanie (Jennifer Grey) the trio do their best to help the morose Cameron gain some much needed perspective. Peppering his film with poignant moments, Hughes also gives audiences plenty of pratfall slapstick humour as high school principle, Ed Rooney (Jeffrey Jones), attempting to catch Ferris, walks into an escalating series of comeuppances.

If you enjoyed this film, you may also like these Ted’s Picks: Sixteen Candles (1984), The Breakfast Club (1985), Don’t You Forget About Me (2009)