Bill and Ted travel through time to complete their end of year history project

Rating: 8/10 (22 October 2011)

This is another of my favourite movies. Most people seem to consider this movie stupid, but I think that it is just great. In some cases this movie is having a little fun with Doctor Who, namely by stealing the telephone version of the time machine, but where Doctor Who's Tardis has been permanently fixed in place as a police box, this time machine was designed as a phone box and operates like a phone box right down to the please dial again message when they try to go to a time that is not connected.
Bill (Alex Winter) and Ted (Keanu Reeves) are inseparable airheads whose dreams are about to be shattered when they are informed that they will flunk history if they do not come up with a good presentation in 24 hours and if they flunk history then Ted will be sent to Alaska. Bill and Ted have visions of becoming great rock and roll stars, but can't play one musical note, though this is not going to stop them, but this problem is dealt with in Bogus Journey, we are just told that they do get better.
Bill and Ted, destined to flunk, are saved when an man from the future comes along and lends them his time machine. Sounds pretty silly, but the reason this happens is because if the fail, they don't form the band, and if they don't form the band then civilisation will collapse. As their history presentation must be impressive, they decide to go back in time and collect figures of historical significance, and then take them on a tour of the home town, San Demas, and then take them to the high school and have them tell every body, on a very flashy sort of way, what they thought.
The way Bill and Ted act is quite amusing, they come across more like wide eyed tourists not realising the danger that they might be in. They wonder through a medieval castle and decide to have a sword fight, even though they will be treated as spies and killed. In the wild west they stuff up a poker game for Billy the Kid and almost get lynched, yet they still come out like tourists. They kidnap Abraham Lincoln and Sigmund Fraud, Ted charms Joan of Arc into coming with him, and lure Gengis Kahn away from his harem with a Twinkie.
This movie lacks intellectual depth, but in my opinion it doesn't need it. Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure is just one excellent movie.