Reviews of the Buckaroo Banzai DVD
The following reviews of the Buckaroo Banzai DVD were published around the web at the time it was released. Check out the official Buckaroo Banzai DVD page on MGM's website at http://www.mgm.com/buckaroobanzai.
A review of the new Buckaroo Banzai Special Edition DVD (written by Mark Keizer) was posted on the http://www.dvdfile.com website on 11/16/01 and you can read it here : http://www.dvdfile.com/software/review/dvd-video_4/adventuresofbuckaroobanzai.html or here (reposted with permission) :
"THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKAROO BANZAI - ACROSS THE 8TH
DIMENSION
MGM Home Entertainment / 1984 / 103 Minutes / Rated PG
Street Date: January 4, 2002
Reviewed by Mark Keizer on November 16, 2001.
To define the cult film is to paraphrase former Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart's opinion of pornography: you can't describe it, but you know it when you see it. To fans, either you're in their secret society or you're on the outside, wondering what all the fuss is about. Consider what is arguably the ultimate cult film, The Rocky Horror Picture Show. To those on the outside, Rocky Horror fans aren't just laughing at a joke you'll never understand, they're certifiably nuts. However, the thing with The Adventures Of Buckaroo Banzai, which MGM has given loving and comprehensive treatment on DVD, is that it violates the cardinal rule of cult filmmaking: it tries to be a cult film. This renders it an amusing curiosity: a film that's telling me it's wacky and trying hard to convince me it's wacky, but in the end, is just lighthearted nonsense.
In The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai(which, if you believe the filmmakers, is based on a true story) Peter Weller plays the title character, a world-renowned brain surgeon, scientist and rock star. As the film begins, Buckaroo is taking his supersonic Jet Car, equipped with his sophisticated Oscillation Overthruster, on a historic trip into the Eighth Dimension. He returns with proof that this Eighth Dimension contains evil Red Lectroids in exile from Planet Ten. As far as I can tell, in 1939 a select group of these Red Lectroids, under the cover of Orson Welles' War of the Worlds radio broadcast, used the Eight Dimension to come to Earth. Now, if they can steal Buckaroo's Oscillation Overthruster, they can free their friends from exile in the Eight Dimension and conquer Planet Ten. The problem is that Planet Ten's benevolent Black Lectroids would rather destroy the Earth then let the Red Lectroids achieve their goals.
The plot of Buckaroo Banzai is like a train that lays it's tracks as it moves along: it makes sense from moment to moment, but by the end, you have absolutely no idea where you are or how you got there. But really, The Adventures Of Buckaroo Banzai is not about the plot, it's about everything around the plot. For instance, Buckaroo's trusted inner circle is a group called The Hong Kong Cavaliers. With names like New Jersey (played by Jeff Goldblum) and Perfect Tommy, they are his backup band and his crime fighting sidekicks (and with the exception of Goldblum, they all dress like they belong to a Huey Lewis and the News cover band). Of course, a film like this is only as good as it's villain. And here, the evil Red Lectroids are led by John Lithgow, who chews copious amounts of scenery as Dr. Emilio Lizardo. And with Weller purposely playing Buckaroo so flat, the movie needs Lithgow's manic and liberating line readings and he gives the most enjoyable performance in the film. Of course, any movie featuring an 80's era Christopher Lloyd has to be a little off it's rocker and here he plays John Bigboote, one of Lizardo's evil henchmen (in one of the funnier gags in the movie, all of Lizardo's henchmen are named John).
The one thing the film does very right is deposit you in a world that is fully and confidently realized. Good movies make you feel as if the characters existed before the film started and they'll continue to live after the film is over. It's this quality (along with quotable lines like "no matter where you go, there you are" and "laugh while you can, Monkey-Boy!") that has garnered the film a small, but loyal following. Yet the fact remains that Buckaroo Banzai is simply not as good as you remember it. Although the pieces are there, the film never comes together as well as it should. Some were bored by Peter Weller's performance: personally, I'm not sure how else he could have played it, but there are times when he does cross the line into bland. There's also a certain snap and spark that's missing from W.D. Richter's direction. And there's a generous helping of cheese in the movie, some of it helps and some of it hurts. The film could also have used a stronger score: obviously, not a lot of money was spent on the music and although Michael Boddicker contributes a catchy main theme, the rest is lacking.
Even with its faults, it's difficult to hate a film that tries so hard to be liked. After all, its heart is in the right place, there are some fun performances and some quippy dialogue. I don't know what twisted version of planet Earth Buckaroo Banzai lives on, but someday it would be nice to return.
Video: How Does The Disc Look?
The Adventures Of Buckaroo Banzai is presented in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen and the result is much more impressive then I expected. The picture is surprisingly clean and bright; there are plenty of newer films that look worse. Grain is kept at a wonderful minimum. Banzai is a fairly colorful film, and every hue is represented well. Most difficult are the deep reds, which tend to cause chroma noise, but here they are solid and rich. Fleshtones are spot-on. Black levels are dark and consistent, however contrast falls off on the low end. In fact, generally the interiors suffer in terms of contrast and shadow delineation. Mysterious laboratories and dank hallways show occasional flicker and are a tad too dark. And even though the picture is admirably clean, dirt is occasionally visible in shots of blue sky and white walls. I found no artifacting and not much in the way of edge enhancements. Detail is pretty good, but the overall picture is a tad soft. Still, somebody kept the original source material in damn good shape, because Banzai has never looked better.
Audio: How Does The Disc Sound?
The Adventures Of Buckaroo Banzai comes with a nice Dolby Digital 5.1 mix. Although not nearly as impressive as the picture quality, the audio gets it done, with a couple of bells and whistles thrown in.
Overall fidelity is fine: sound is not overwhelmingly full and while all the lows and highs are utilized over the course of the movie, it's an average enveloping track. Luckily, there is absolutely no hiss, distortion or dropout. Dialogue was a different story: emanating mostly from the center channel, the dialogue was thin at times and occasionally even a bit hard to understand. This is probably because there wasn't a lot of money for ADR, so the production sound was used more than the filmmakers would have preferred. Still, in mixing the DVD, someone should have rode the dialogue levels a little harder. Surrounds are employed amply. Lefts and rights are sprinkled liberally for the synth score, high-speed vehicles and the beeping of various pieces of computer equipment. Rears are employed occasionally and there is some imaging, but again, nothing that creates a fun, campy, enveloping sci-fi experience. Bass kicks in nicely for spaceship rumblings and various other sound effects. In all, while a stronger mix would have really made the film rock, the mix provided is fine.
The disc also features a French audio track and French and Spanish subtitles, and English Closed Captions.
Supplements: What Goodies Are There?
Remember when your parents tried to get you to quit smoking by making you inhale cigarette after cigarette until you were ready to throw up? A similar feeling may come over you after you see the boatload of extras MGM has unloaded onto this disc. To fans, it's a dream come true, although I defy any Buckaroo booster to read some of this stuff more than once. Admittedly though, it is amazing how detailed the Banzai universe is.
First, there is a scene-specific audio commentary with director WD Richter and writer Earl Mac Rauch. The conceit here is they both treat the film as if Banzai actually existed, referring to the film as a "documentary" or "docudrama." I'm willing to buy into that as long as they keep the real behind-the-scenes tidbits coming, but they really don't. Richter admits he hadn't seen the movie in about six years, and while the commentary is interesting in spurts, as a whole it's disappointing.
The same can said for a feature called Pinky Carruther's Unknown Facts. In the film, Pinky (played by Billy Vera) was one of Buckaroo's Blue Blaze Irregulars, a group of assistants who work at the Banzai Institute helping Buckaroo do whatever the hell it is he does. Here, using the subtitle track, Pinky gives us scene specific information about the film, but like the commentary, he treats Buckaroo and the Institute as real. It gets tiresome after a while.
The disc also features a 23-minute Declassified Documentary on the making of the film. It's presented in widescreen and features a new interview with WD Richter, who of course, treats the whole affair as if Buckaroo actually lived. What makes this enjoyable is behind-the-scenes footage of makeup tests, clay models and jet-powered cars. There is also some footage of the 1984 EPK featuring the actors.
Next are 14 deleted scenes, which are presented in anamorphic widescreen and preceded by a chyron page explaining where the excised footage fit into the movie. The material is from WD Richter's personal collection and was taken from a VHS copy of a workprint. However, considering the years it spent sitting in a box in Richter's attic, the footage looks fine. Just be aware that there's no color correction and some scenes have a fair amount of dirt. The sound is acceptable most of the time. Only one scene features sound so muffled it's difficult to understand. Most scenes run less than a minute and are just extensions of existing scenes. In terms of the Banzai canon, nothing interesting is gleaned, except we learn that Buckaroo's wife was killed by someone named Hanoi Xan of the World Crime League.
The most important deleted scene is the Alternate Opening, which features Jamie Lee Curtis as Banzai's mother. The scene is perfectly restored and looks as good as the rest of the film. It can be viewed separately or seamlessly integrated into the theatrical cut as a prologue. In the scene, we see home movie footage of a 5-year old Buckaroo in the desert watching his parents perform a test using the Jet Car. Annoyingly, in his commentary, Richter claims the scene was deleted because Banzai didn't want footage of his now-dead mother used in the film.
Next on our hit parade of extra features are two theatrical trailers. The first is the 1984 teaser trailer for the film. Presented in anamorphic widescreen, the trailer looks as good as the movie, except for a speck or two. The other trailer was created in 1998 as a sales tool for a proposed Buckaroo Banzai TV series called "Ancient Secrets and New Mysteries." The trailer is 100% computer animated. The first half shows the Jet Car being pursued by bad guys across icy terrain. The second half portrays the Space Shuttle, it's nose gear destroyed, landing on the Jet Car. Considering it's only two minutes, I thought it was kinda cool.
There are also text profiles of the Hong Kong Cavaliers and all the other heroes and villains in the film. Surprisingly, the profile of Buckaroo's girlfriend Penny Priddy (Ellen Barkin) mentions that two years after the film was made, she was murdered by Hanoi Xan. For Ms. Barkin, what an odd way to find out your character has been killed off. The most elaborate profile is saved for Buckaroo. His includes fancy menus along with text and some moving video. Unfortunately, there is no bio information on the actors who actually played these roles. "Jet Car All Access" is a comprehensive look at the vehicle that broke through to the Eighth Dimension. Like Buckaroo's character profile, this supplement features it's own menu system, along with moving video and a statistical analysis of the automobile.
Into the homestretch, we also have a still gallery dozens of photos of Buckaroo and his friends throughout the decades, starting with the 1930s. For those silly enough to be interested in the making of the film, there are some Behind-the-Scenes photos as well. But there is nothing here you'd watch more than once. The Banzai Institute Archives are a (much too) detailed look at the Banzai universe. All text, it includes diary entries, schematics of the Hong Kong Cavaliers tour bus and an interview with Buckaroo.
DVD-ROM Exclusives: What do you get when you pop the disc in your PC?
No ROM extras have been included.
Parting Thoughts
If you're a fan of The Adventures Of Buckaroo Banzai, this new DVD is an obvious purchase since, let's face it, nothing will stop you from buying it anyway (especially at a retail price of only $19.98). Luckily, MGM Home Video has given the film solid three-star treatment that befits its cult status. The picture looks wonderful and there is an exhaustive array of extras that, while overkill to non-fans, will be manna from Heaven to followers of the Banzai legend. For those who've never seen "Buckaroo Banzai", the film is definitely worth renting, if only to see what all the fuss is about. And much of that fuss is warranted. For all its flaws, the film is funny and likable, with a light, comic book touch. "Buckaroo Banzai" was obviously (some would say, too obviously) created to spawn comic books, arcade games, sequels and TV spin-offs that, rightly or wrongly, never happened. So considering this is probably all the world will ever know of Mr. Banzai, DVD owners are hereby advised to do what they can to maintain his hard-fought status as cult hero.
DISC FEATURES
Specifications
- DVD-Video
- DVD-14
- Region 1
Aspect Ratio(s):
- 2.35:1 Anamorphic Widescreen
Dolby Digital Formats:
- English 5.1 Surround
- French 2.0 Surround
Subtitles/Captions:
- English Closed Captions
- French Subtitles
- Spanish Subtitles
Standard Features:
- Interactive Menus
- Scene Access
Additional Features:
- Screen-specific audio commentary with director WD Richter and
writer Earl Mac Rauch
- Pinky Carruther's Unknown Facts subtitle track
- "Declassified Documentary" featurette
- 14 Deleted scenes
- "Banzai Institute Archives" and character profiles
- Still gallery
- Theatrical trailers
List Price: $19.95"
This Buckaroo Banzai DVD review is by Glenn Erickson, who actually worked on the DVD, and his original review was posted on 12/2/01 and can be found at http://www.dvdtalk.com/dvdsavant/s365banzai.html.
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension:
SE
MGM/UA // PG // $19.99 // January 2, 2002
Review by DVD Savant | posted
December 3, 2001
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
Does not street until January 2, 2002
One of your more interesting cult titles, Buckaroo Banzai has grown a small but fanatically loyal following in the 17 years since its boxoffice flopparoo in 1984. By inventing a franchise hero who combines Doc Savage, The Lone Ranger and a rock'n roll superstar in one, writer Earl Mac Rauch would have been on the top of a mountain of sequels, tie-ins and merchandising had this first feature succeeded. Purposely confusing and sometimes laboring too hard to be off-the-wall flippant, Buckaroo Banzai nevertheless shapes up as a fun adventure along the lines of a Republic Serial - but with a hip attitude.
Synopsis:
Surgeon, rock musician, particle physicist and leader of the Hong Kong Cavaliers, Buckaroo Banzai (Peter Weller) comes back from a trip to the 8th dimension with the ability to see the villainous Red Lectroids who have come from that alternate reality and are living among us. They've taken possession of Doctor Emilio Lizardo (John Lithgow) who now goes by the name of Lord John Whorfin. Together with Red Lectroids John Bigboote (Christopher Lloyd) and John O'Connor (Vincent Schiavelli), they steal the ocillation overthruster invented by Professor Hikita (Robert Ito) to return to the 8th dimension. Unfortunately, the benign Black Lectroids don't want them back, and Black Lectroid John Parker (Carl Lumbly) brings a message from leader John Emdall (Rosalind Cash) that distills into blackmail: Earth will be destroyed unless Buckaroo and his Cavaliers stop the Red Lectroids in time. Buckaroo enlists stalwarts Reno (Pepe Serna) and Rawhide (Clancy Brown) and enlists new members New Jersey (Jeff Goldblum) and Penny Priddy (Ellen Barkin) into the crusade to make the Earth safe from the Red Lectroid scum.
What makes a cult film? Buckaroo Banzai certainly qualifies, even if its makers planned for such status from the beginning. Decidedly not hip  1 but refreshingly cool  2 , the Hong Kong Cavaliers are a collection of nerds and pretty boys with true-blue devotion to their leader and the United States of America, in that order. Perhaps Buckaroo's time has come, although I think America's probably more ready for DC Comics' Blackhawks to strut their quasifascist stuff.  3
As a movie, Buckaroo Banzai could perhaps be better, but could also be an awful lot worse. Remember, the decade after Star Wars brought forth rubbish like The Ice Pirates, camp epics that tried to emulate Lucas and fell on their faces. Director Richter animates Rauch's world with energy and commitment, embracing every awkward situation (the discovery of Penny Priddy crying in a cabaret audience) and making sure every cornball dialogue line is delivered as if it were the most serious utterance ever heard in a movie theater. Even the manic Emilio Lizardo is played straight. The wackiness is unified into something we can care about - a consistently earnest tone, the maintenance of which is no mean feat.
Deadpan Peter Weller puts just enough ironic curve on his delivery to have fun with his role without condescendsion; he's also vulnerable enough to be an interesting hero. His Cavaliers are interestingly orchestrated, personalities with varying combinations of the cool and the klunky that allow actors like Pepe Serna and Clancy Brown to be distinctive without reams of 'character color' written into their dialogue. Jeff Goldblum is amusingly green, and Ellen Barkin interestingly waifish, even when striding about in a scarlet cocktail dress.
The villains on view are mostly a pack of clowns, led by the wonderful John Lithgow's Lizardo. A tight bundle of goofy mannerisms and extreme facial expressions, Lizardo is wonderful working with the tightass Christopher Lloyd and sub-moron Red Lectroids Schiavelli and Dan Hedaya.
As icing on the cake, the imaginative special effects include interesting organic spaceships, giant flying seashells that look as if they were grown instead of constructed. A handful of different effects shops that sprang up after Star Wars participated in the wide variety of effects that were needed, and these are scaled nicely to the show without overwhelming it. Some of the effects and special makeup actually barely make the grade, yet seem just perfect.
The only real detriments to Buckaroo Banzai are the action scenes and the settings. Without a budget for large sets, altogether too much of the film takes place in (yawn) derelict factories, with endless games of tag being played in nondescript corridors and hallways. The movie also seems a bit shortchanged for rough stuff, and doesn't pay off on the action promised by all the guns, martial arts and samurai hardware brandished by the Cavaliers. On the other hand, this may be a plus for fans sick of the so-called 'science fiction' movies that are really lame action films.
It's fun watching the oddball characters interact and bounce off one another, and the self-conscious cornball factor is a big plus. Scooter Lindley (Damon Hines) rushes out to tell his father Casper (Bill Henderson) that Buckaroo needs help, and receives a 'Say What?' that usually brings down the house. Obnoxious Perfect Tommy (Lewis Smith) is constantly being put in his place for being such an egoist, or placated with reminders that he is, after all, perfect. When all the Cavaliers function as a working unit, blending their technical expertise towards a common goal, the picture becomes a kind of Utopia for young adult males: coolness, hi-technology, guns, and rock music. You can imagine the Fox executives sweating when screenings were greeted with mostly smiles and chuckles instead of belly laughs. Word of mouth was good but this isn't the kind of crowdpleaser that studios understand, then or now.
MGM's DVD of Buckaroo Banzai presents a fine new transfer of the standard 1984 cut, in 16:9 and letterboxed for the first time on video. There was an early laserdisc that was a collector's treasure even though its squeezed and pan'n scanned image looked terrible. The transfer is so good, some of the special effects shots are shown to have optical dirt printed in, a flaw that could have been cleaned up digitally, one could suppose. This Special Edition has a number of unusual extras that will either thrill fans or frustrate them, depending on what they expect from their special edition DVDs.
The extras address one of the main problems that hurt the show when it was new. At the last minute, extraneous background plotting was removed that would have helped some of the relationships make better sense. Thinking the movie too complicated, they jettisoned a prologue that explained Buckaroo's name and heritage, the genesis of the overthruster, and the relationship between Penny Priddy and Buckaroo's dead wife, who looked just like her. Losing this background info (which was presented in a fairly exciting manner) robbed Buckaroo of a lot of needed depth, while alienating literal-minded viewers who wanted all the plot details to add up to an even number.
The special edition DVD was not scaled big enough to take in the entire production. Also, although reels of star interviews and behind-the-scenes video were shot, none was retained by anyone except director W.D. Richter, who only had VHS tape copies, often with time-code windows.
But Richter and Rauch were anxious to use the Special Edition to promote new life for their one-shot 'franchise' and gave the project much valuable assistance. The extras are consistent with their take on the show, and account for the tongue-in-cheek tone that pretends that Buckaroo is a real historical figure and that the movie is simply an attempt to popularize, for the big screen, a small fraction of his many exploits. This conceit is maintained well by Richter and Earl Mac Rauch, who pretends to be the real-life Reno on the main commentary track; hopefully it won't be taken as too taxing by fans who'd prefer a straight approach. Savant himself has no use whatsoever for prank commentaries as found on discs like Blood simple. Besides including BTS looks at the miniatures (with Greg Jein, Savant's old boss in special effects) and the ferocious functioning Jet Car, the extras include the missing deleted scenes that explain Buckaroo's backstory and introduce the all-important unseen character Hanoi Xan (pronounced Shan).
The only extra piece of footage that was found intact on 35mm (instead of VHS) and was therefore able to be reintegrated into the film was an alternate opening that takes the form of the Banzai's home movies from 1954. A series of outtakes of Clancy Brown's narration were found and a new audio opening cut from them, as no track was located. Â 4 This alternate opening, which features James Saito and Jamie Lee Curtis (!) as Buckaroo's parents, is offered both as a stand-alone extra, and as an alternate seamless branch during DVD playback. It bears the original title, just plain Buckaroo Banzai. It's funny that original distributor 20th-Fox wanted to simplify the story, but opted to complicate the title into the desperate-sounding final concoction. Can't anyone learn from The Fearless Vampire Killers, or pardon me, but your teeth are in my neck? It was once the elegant Dance of the Vampires.
The Internet Movie Database lists a director's long cut, as if Buckaroo Banzai had been finished with these scenes and others intact. It wasn't, and none of the 35mm workprint elements for longer cuts were found in the scraps and snips of trims and outs still archived for the film. They were undoubtedly carefully set aside, and .... who knows. The fact that Buckaroo was an independent handed off to a series of rights holders and libraries before coming to MGM didn't simplify the research process. Therefore, the only element for the missing scenes was Richter's own VHS of a workprint-in-progress transferred to let the sound cutters get a head start. This is the original for the many bootlegs, so at least it's good VHS quality. Every snipped section is presented with handles that help place it in context within the film. A couple of unused scenes that didn't even make the workprint are included, from 35mm workprint trims; the sound on these was poorly transferred to mag film and is therefore almost inaudible. Â 5 The project producer hoped to reconstitute more of the scenes Richter would have liked to reinstate, but found only the prologue. The audio for that had to be reinvented from scratch.
Savant still finds Buckaroo Banzai to be amusing and diverting; his kids think it's great. It's certainly out of the ordinary, which in these cookiecutter days of entertainment, is high praise. Finally available in a good widescreen transfer, it's really worth checking out.
On a scale of Excellent, Good, Fair, and Poor, The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension rates:
Movie: Good
Video: Excellent
Sound: Excellent
Supplements: Docu: Buckaroo Banzai Declassified,
alternate opening, deleted scenes
Packaging: Amaray case
Reviewed: December 3, 2001
1. Defined as fashionable, narcissistic and exclusionary, as in Our Man Flint. Radiating Hipness always carries the implication that others around you are not hip. Return
2. Coolness on the other hand, is simply being at ease with one's individuality and uniqueness. You aspire to the right appearance and behavior to be Cool, although the fastest route to Coolness is just aggressively being yourself, assuming you're a positive individual. On the other hand, misfits and outcasts can be Cool just by being true to their natures. The Frankenstein monster is a beautiful person, man, and is as Cool as they come ... without an ounce of Hipness. Return
3. Among movies that had a chance for DVD release before 9.11, and probably no longer do, are Fistful of Dynamite and Viva Maria!. Both glorify heroes who would be labeled Terrorists today. Return
4. This accounts for the different wording from the much-circulated VHS workprint, and a different year named for the demise of Buckaroo's parents. Return
5. Savant cut the docu and the alternate opening, and helped compile the video extras on the disc, so take all his comments with that in mind. I've tried to be as objective as possible. Return
This review from the Digital Bits website (http://www.thedigitalbits.com) can be found at (http://www.thedigitalbits.com/reviews2/buckaroobanzai.html) and was posted on 12/31/01.
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth
Dimension Special Edition - 1984 (2001)
20th Century Fox (MGM)
review by Bill Hunt, editor of The Digital Bits
Film Rating: B
Disc Ratings (Video/Audio/Extras): B+/B/B+
Specs and Features
82 mins, PG, letterboxed widescreen (2.35:1), 16x9 enhanced, single sided, RSDL dual layered (layer switch at 43:03, in chapter 6), keep case packaging, audio commentary with director W.D. Richter and writer Earl Mac Raugh (in the guise of the real Reno), Pinky Carruther's Unknown Facts subtitle track, alternate opening featuring Jamie Lee Curtis, Buckaroo Banzai Declassified featurette, 14 deleted scenes from the work print, new Jet Car trailer, teaser trailer, Buckaroo Banzai personal profile, other character profiles, Jet Car details, photo gallery, Banzai Institute Archives (containing schematics, photos of movie tie-ins, badges and Hong Kong Cavaliers CD covers, details on the filming locations, text interview with Buckaroo Banzai, Banzai Radio interview with Terry Erdman, Banzai Institute history and Hikita's diary entries), several Easter eggs, Nuon features, animated film-themed menu screens with animation and music, scene selection (16 chapters), languages: English (DD 5.1) and French (DD 2.0 mono), subtitles: French and Spanish, Closed Captioned
"Laugh while you can, monkey boy!"
You know... there just aren't many films like Buckaroo Banzai. In fact, about the only other film that I can think of that even comes close is Big Trouble in Little China. Put yourself in the 1980s campy, quasi-SciFi mindframe, and you're in the right ball park. Sort of.
Our story starts as the infamous Buckaroo Banzai (played by Peter Weller) is preparing to test his suped-up, high-powered Jet Car (but not before consulting on an intricate brain surgery - Buck's a man of many talents). Buckaroo climbs into the cockpit of the car and installs a strange device - an Oscillation Overthruster. Then the car blasts down range on a faster-than-sound test run. But something goes wrong... or so it seems. The car careens off the test track and heads right for a mountain. But just as it looks as if Buckaroo's about to bite it, he suddenly engages his Overthruster... and the car drives right through solid rock, blasting through the mountain and into the mysterious Eighth Dimension. News of this scientific breakthrough is quick to spread, and it soon reaches the maniacal Doctor Emilio Lizardo (John Lithgow), who has been confined to a mental hospital in New Jersey since one of his experiments went horribly wrong years ago and drove him crazy. But it seems that he isn't really crazy... just possessed by the spirit of an alien Red Lectoid named Lord John Whorfin. Whorfin wants to free his Evil Red Lectoid comrades, who are trapped in the Eighth Dimension, and he needs Buckaroo's Overthruster to do it. So with his loyal henchmen John Bigboote (Christopher Lloyd) and John Gomez (Dan Hedaya), he sets out to steal the Overthruster... and hopefully destroy Buckaroo in the process. But Buckaroo never stands alone - he's got the hard-rockin', atom-crackin' Hong Kong Cavaliers on his side. And if things really get desperate, he can always call upon his worldwide network of Blue Blazer Regulars. When they're not busy fighting the World Crime League, of course.
Buckaroo Banzai is one of those films that you either already love, don't get or have just never seen. I first caught it during its theatrical run back in the 80s, and its off-kilter brand of absurd-yet-straight-laced humor hit me right square between the eyes. As a fan of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Airplane and the shenanigans of Monty Python, I took to it immediately. If you enjoyed John Lithgow and Christopher Lloyd in 3rd Rock from the Sun and Back to the Future respectively, you'll love absolutely love their over the top performances here. Other cast highlights include Jeff Goldblum as New Jersey (in a role that's very much hinted at in his later appearances in ID4 and Jurassic Park) and a very young Ellen Barkin as Penny Priddy, Buckaroo's hair-teased femme fatale. You even get Yakov Smirnoff in a bit part - no kidding.
But Buckaroo Banzai is not a great film by any stretch. Its major flaw lies in its direction and editing - this is not a well-paced film. It doesn't build on the humor (there are some VERY funny throw away gags here) and it doesn't build much tension either. It also doesn't help that the film's soundtrack is a lot hokey - a cheesy, early 80s brand of synthesizers and drum machines. You'll either love Buckaroo Banzai or hate it. But I dig it and, for me at least, this DVD's been a LONG time in coming.
Thankfully, the wait was by and large worth it. The video on this DVD looks surprisingly good, given the film's new anamorphic widescreen transfer. The contrast is very nice, with deep, detailed shadows, yet the brighter areas of the picture are never overblown. Most impressive is the color, which is surprisingly rich, accurate and vibrant, while never bleeding or otherwise falling short. The print itself also looks quite good. It's occasionally soft, and there's moderate grain visible at times, but the print is in great shape - very clean and free of dirt, dust and other blemishes once you get past the opening credit sequence. You may occasionally notice compression artifacting and edge enhancement, but they aren't too much of a distraction. Overall, this is a very good, but not great transfer. Fans should be quite happy with it. You've certainly never seen Buckaroo looking this good before.
The disc's audio is also generally quite good, available here in a newly re-mixed Dolby Digital 5.1. I would have appreciated the inclusion of the film's original stereo track, but the new mix is enough to satisfy. The track sports a surprisingly wide and smooth front soundstage, with good ambience created in the rear channels. The film isn't really too active in terms of surround sound effects, but when they're needed, the mix handles them just fine. Mostly, you get ambience reinforcement from the surround speakers, which accomplish that task well. Dialogue can occasionally sound a little flat, and low frequency is a little wanting at times. But like the video, the audio is much improved here and should please fans of the film, if not surround sound connoisseurs.
Here's where my first major complaint about this disc comes in. There are no English subtitles. And at a couple of points in the film, some of the dialogue is a bit tough to understand. I suspect it's just the way the dialogue was recorded and mixed originally. But when I went to check the subtitles, I discovered they're only available in French and Spanish. Doh!
Now for the extras. Here's the schtick of this DVD, and I think it's pretty funny: this disc was assembled as if it were produced by the actual Banzai Institute. That means that the material here is rife with in-jokes. Only fans are going to get all of them. But if you are a fan, this disc is a real treat. To start with, you get a tongue-in-cheek audio commentary with the film's director W.D. Richter and the real Reno from the Banzai Institute (it's actually writer Earl Mac Rauch, but play along here). The two dissect the film and talk about how the "real" Buckaroo Banzai liked the film. You see... the further schtick here is that the film itself is a dramatization of "real" events, so the people you're watching on screen are only actors playing the "real" Buckaroo Banzai and the Hong Kong Cavaliers. If you buy into it, it's pretty funny. There's also subtitle track of Pinky Carruther's Unknown Facts (Carruthers being a character in the film played by musician Billy Vera, although again, it's Rauch who wrote all this stuff). It's filled with funny bits of trivia, again in keeping with the gag. Fourteen deleted scenes are available here too, taken from the film's work print (so they're not anamorphic and the quality is poor... but they're here, so no complaining). And there's even the film's alternate extended opening, which features Jamie Lee Curtis as Buckaroo Banzai's mother. You can view this separately, or you can choose to view it not quite seamlessly restored to the film itself (when you go to play the film, you choose between the theatrical cut and the extended). I say not quite seamlessly, because the switch from the alternate opening to the rest of the film triggered a long pause in my player - my other major complaint about this disc. But hey... it's fun to see regardless.
Hang on there, Blue Blazers! We're just getting started. This disc also includes the film's original teaser trailer (in anamorphic widescreen) and a new Jet Car promo trailer that was created by the folks at Foundation Imaging to sell the idea of a Buckaroo Banzai TV series. The idea never flew, but it's cool to have the trailer here (it's otherwise only been seen at SciFi conventions). You get a behind-the-scenes featurette on the making of the film from the 1980s, Buckaroo Banzai Declassified, along with a detailed profile of the "real" Buckaroo Banzai. Then there are profiles of most of the characters in the film, a look under the hood at the Jet Car, an extensive gallery of photos (broken down by subject) and some Nuon features no one cares about (because only like three people have a Nuon-enhanced player to access them). I doubt you're missing anything if you can't view them. And then there's a fun section called the Banzai Institute Archives. This is filled with schematics of the Tour Bus and Complex BB, photos of movie tie-ins, badges and CD covers by the Hong Kong Cavaliers (gotta love Your Place or Mayan?), a list of the film locations, the text of a pair of reviews of the film, a text interview with the "real" Buckaroo Banzai, a history of the Institute, entries from Hikita's diary and even a ten minute Banzai Radio interview with with Terry Erdman (who was the Fox publicist for the film back in 1984). Finally, there are several Easter eggs hidden throughout the disc's menu screens, including quotes, alternate DVD menu designs and alternate DVD cover designs (oh, how I wish they'd been used). There's even a funny bit about the watermelon - 'nuff said. They're funny and pretty easy to find if you search around.
The bottom line is that a lot of care has gone into this disc, and if you're a fan, you're really going to love it. A lot of other people are going to completely miss the gags and be left scratching their heads. Screw 'em! This baby's aimed at you diehards anyway, and it's got plenty of mojo. So fire up your Oscillation Overthrusters and enjoy.
By the way... when I tried to reach Buckaroo Banzai himself, to see what he thinks about the DVD, turns out he was still working on that World Crime League sequel and so was unavailable for comment. His publicist at the Banzai Institute did, however, send over this statement: "Nothing is ever what it seems, but everything is exactly what it is." I'm still not sure if he meant the DVD or the sequel, but there it is...
Bill Hunt
billhunt@thedigitalbits.com
This review from the defunct Cinescape website can be found at
the Internet Archive's wayback machine here (https://web.archive.org/web/20060225022445/https://cinescape.com/0/editorial.asp?aff_id=0&this_cat=Video+%2526+DVD&action=page&obj_id=32108)
and was originally posted on 01/07/02.
DVD Review
THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKAROO BANZAI ACROSS THE EIGHTH DIMENSION
Laugh while you can, Monkey-boy!
Dateline: Monday, January 7, 2002
By: MICHAEL TUNISON Managing Editor
Finally, a little love for Buckaroo.
Misunderstood at the time of its 1984 theatrical release and
all but ignored in subsequent years by a series of corporate
owners who seemed oblivious to its cult appeal, the
spectacularly quirky sci-fi/action comedy THE ADVENTURES OF
BUCKAROO BANZAI ACROSS THE EIGHTH DIMENSION had to wait almost
two decades for the sort of fan-friendly product support today’s
run-of-the-mill studio genre flick receives as a matter of
course. Happily, MGM Home Entertainment has gone some distance
in redressing the property’s years of neglect with this
long-awaited Special Edition DVD release, an extra-packed
Banzai-nanza that, for once, will allow Buckaroo-loving Blue
Blaze irregulars to hold up their heads in the company of
Trekkies and Star Warriors.
While countless films from Woody Allen’s 1973 spoof SLEEPER to
1999’s character-rich GALAXY QUEST have memorably poked fun at
science fiction concepts over the decades, it would be hard to
name one that dives as deeply into its own loopy mythology as
BUCKAROO. The product of a unique collaboration between
novelist-turned-screenwriter Earl Mac Rauch and
screenwriter-turned-director W.D. Richter, this masterpiece of
weirdo self-indulgence is so inside its strange little world
that the viewer has the impression of having tuned in at the
middle of a long-running saga, complete with unexplained
references and in-jokes. While the spinners of fantastic tales
have a long history of relying on allusions to elements “outside
the frame” to create a sense of reality, BUCKAROO carries the
idea to hilarious extremes with its refusal to spend hardly any
time inside the frame. No wonder so many mainstream viewers left
the theater scratching their heads after confronting this
improbable little film back in ’84.
The comically elaborate storyline is set up as, in the course of
a single busy day, the half-Japanese, half-Texan
scientist/adventurer Dr. Buckaroo Banzai (genre favorite Peter
Weller of ROBOCOP fame) jumps from performing brain surgery to
driving his experimental jet car through the eighth dimension to
leading the multitalented members of his rock band, the Hong
Kong Cavaliers, in a spirited club gig. Following the news of
the jet car experiment with keen interest is an old enemy,
madman physicist Dr. Emilio Lizardo (3RD ROCK FROM THE SUN’s
John Lithgow), who proceeds to escape from a mental institution
with the intention of getting his hands on the “Oscillation
Overthruster” device that allowed Team Banzai to crack the
eighth-dimensional barrier. For reasons too complicated to delve
into here, all this ties into the plans of an army of renegade
Red Lectroids from Planet 10 to stage a dimension-hopping
invasion that places Earth in the utmost peril.
The richness of Rauch’s imaginary world is matched by the
filmmakers’ daring willingness to include such seemingly
extraneous details as the fact that a missing team member is
currently on a mission to Tibet, or the now-legendary (in Blue
Blaze circles, at least) non sequitur moment in which the
Cavaliers played by Jeff Goldblum and Pepe Serna pass a
watermelon sitting in a pressing machine in the old factory the
Red Lectroids are using as their Earth base. (“Why is there a
watermelon there?” Goldblum asks. “I’ll tell you later,” Serna
replies.)
Making his directorial debut in the middle of a successful
career as a screenwriter (his writing credits include the
acclaimed 1978 version of INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and the
1979 Frank Langella DRACULA), Richter stages Rauch’s
idiosyncratic character exchanges with a dry, offhand tone that
keeps things surprisingly real despite the bizarreness of nearly
everything that happens on-screen. Of course, it helps that the
filmmakers landed such dynamic cast members as Goldblum,
Lithgow, Christopher Lloyd (as the unfortunately named Red
Lectroid John Bigboote) and Ellen Barkin (as the sexy, scrappy
heroine Penny Priddy), all of whom would go on to demonstrate
their ability to pump life into far less inspired material than
this in their subsequent careers. For his part, Weller is a
complete delight whether spinning his six-guns or deadpanning
Rauch’s skewed take on cornball action hero dialogue.
Aside from the sharpest, cleanest version of the picture fans
have seen since its original theatrical release, the DVD offers
a generous helping of extra features, including a set of deleted
scenes that indicate Rauch and Richter’s initial conception of
BUCKAROO was even weirder than what ended up on-screen. The most
prominent of these is a prologue featuring the fate of the
hero’s particle physicist parents (Mom is played by none other
than Jamie Lee Curtis) years before the main action of the film.
This and other deleted fragments, most of which are presented in
an unpolished form struck from Richter’s personal copies of work
prints, are also notable for their references to Hanoi Xan, the
dreaded leader of the World Crime League. Rauch seeded the
script with mentions to Xan, whom he viewed as Buckaroo’s main
adversary in the saga’s larger mythology, but the filmmakers
were forced by their production company bosses to trim this
material for fear of making the flick even more confusing than
it already was.
Rauch and Richter’s idiosyncratic sense of fun is also felt in
other special features such as a making-of documentary,
“Buckaroo Banzai Declassified,” in which a straight-faced
Richter speaks of the assistance the “real” Dr. Banzai gave to
those responsible for the screen version of his adventures, as
well as a humorous text feature in which Hong Kong Cavalier Reno
attempts to interview a sarcastic, uncooperative Buckaroo. While
the DVD is no substitute for what fans really want – a sequel,
dammit! – it’s still the best addition to Buckaroo lore since
Rauch’s hilariously unconventional novelization from the time of
the film’s original release.
And remember: No matter where you watch it… there you are.
THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKAROO BANZAI ACROSS THE EIGHTH DIMENSION
Movie Grade: A Disc Grade: B+
Reviewed Format: DVD
Rated: PG
Stars: Peter Weller, John Lithgow, Ellen Barkin, Christopher
Lloyd, Jeff Goldblum
Writer: Earl Mac Rauch
Director: W.D. Richter
Distributor: MGM Home Entertainment
Original Year of Release: 1984
Suggested Retail Price: $19.98
Extras: widescreen anamorphic; Dolby Digital 5.1; deleted
scenes; making-of featurette; teaser trailer; director and
screenwriter commentaries; cast and character profiles; French
mono language track; French and Spanish subtitles
This review from the Ain't It Cool News website (http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=11158)
and was posted on 1/6/02.
ALEXANDRA DuPONT Breaches 8th Dimension w/ BUCKAROO BANZAI!!
Published at: Jan. 6, 2002, 11:51 p.m. CST by staff
Some love “The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth
Dimension” and some only want to love it very much. I, sadly,
fall into the latter category. Peter Weller, Jeff Goldblum,
Ellen Barkin and John Lithgow (channelling a “Holy Grail”-era
John Cleese) in an unauthorized reimagining of “Doc Savage: Man
of Bronze”?? It could not go wrong – and yet … well … I had to
purchase the DVD just to hear the commentary and discover how it
went wrong.
The pitiless irony, of course, is that young Ms. DuPont is as
much a revered musician, prize-winning physicist, sports car
enthusiast, board-certified physician and fearless fighter of
crime as the fictional Buckaroo. Unlike Mr. Banzai, she’s also a
world-class geneticist, script doctor, Greenpeace organizer,
fashion model and appraiser of digital video discs.
Thanks as always to The DVD Journal for the regular loan of the
comely (and versatile!) Alexandra's fabulous Sunday-night
reviews!
Review by Alexandra
DuPont
"Buckaroo studied bujitsu and particle physics. His skill with a
six-shooter is reputed to eclipse that of Wyatt Earp. He speaks
a dozen languages and has written songs in each of them. His
band, the Hong Kong Cavaliers, is one of the most popular,
hard-rocking bar bands in east Texas. The band's popularity is
somewhat surprising, considering its members. Instead of
professional musicians, the band is made up of cartographers and
botanists, linguists and propellant engineers, an entomologist
and an epidemiologist. These experts and their odd fields of
interest were drawn to Buckaroo, and each of them came and went
like the wind on the prairie (Rawhide, Reno, the Swede, Perfect
Tommy, Big Norse, Red River Daddy, the Seminole Kid and Pecos,
to name but a few)."
— From the "Personal Profile" of Dr. Buckaroo Banzai — one of
the many amusingly overcooked, text-driven extras on the
Buckaroo Banzai DVD.
*
* *
I. Introduction: The fans get what they want.
[box cover]The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai: Across the Eighth
Dimension is one of those movies where, to abuse the cliché, if
you're the sort of person who really likes this sort of thing,
this is the sort of thing you're really going to like.
A flawed, low-budget puree of Doc Savage, science fiction,
absurd comedy, '80s-synth/barroom rock, and cheesy action — most
of it played with conviction and without much explanation —
Banzai has developed a small cult following since its 1984
box-office belly-flop. Said cult is made up of more or less the
same people (including this reviewer, truth be told) who
fetishize the spoof-fantasy subgenre — a growing field that
includes the long-running British sci-fi comedy series "Red
Dwarf," Big Trouble in Little China (co-written by Banzai's
director, W.D. Richter), the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
novels, and the Terry Pratchett/Neil Gaiman angels-and-demons
farce Good Omens (currently being developed for the big screen
by Terry Gilliam).
Banzai fans, as it happens, are also a pretty vocal lot — in
fact, their howls of protest are the reason the Banzai DVD
release was delayed throughout 2001. MGM Home Entertainment used
the extra time to jam-pack the disc with fan-appeasing extras.
The result is a marvelous, surprising platter that, unlike most
DVDs, extends the movie's fiction rather than deconstructing it.
(The DVD finally arrived on Jan. 1, 2002.)
Allow me to explain. It's kind of a no-duh that most
extras-packed DVDs pick apart a movie's constructed fiction with
making-of documentaries, director commentaries, and assorted
behind-the-scenes glimpses. While there's plenty of this sort of
material on the Banzai disc, the creators of Buckaroo Banzai
have also adopted a thematic conceit for their extras, which
they carry off with surprising consistency:
Buckaroo Banzai actually exists, and the Buckaroo Banzai movie
was a "docudrama" chronicling his real-life exploits.
Ridiculous? Absolutely. But it's also courageous — and pretty
much unprecedented on DVD. Banzai director W.D. Richter and
screenwriter Earl Mac Rauch (playing "Reno Nevada," the
fictional chronicler of the "Banzai Institute") rush headlong
into the idea, gleefully making fools of themselves among the
disc's many extras. The end result isn't for everyone — but if
you're willing to play along, you'll find that the myriad extras
(listed in excruciating detail below) act as a sort of footnotes
to the movie, expanding its universe tenfold and ultimately
transforming a love-it-or-hate-it flick into a vastly richer
multimedia experience.
*
* *
II. What's the story?
As excerpted from the back of screenwriter Rauch's
extraordinary novelization of the film, recently re-issued by
Pocket Books:
"Buckaroo Banzai [Peter Weller]. A strange, elusive figure, his
name whispered in barrooms and boardrooms, his advice sought by
pashas and presidents, his exploits recounted in movies, novels,
and comic books that seem somehow more real than life itself....
First and foremost an extraordinary brain surgeon. In his spare
time designer and driver of the electrifying Jet Car, a speed
machine faster than sound!.... Join Team Banzai on their
two-fisted, action-packed assault against the evil red Lectroids
from the Planet 10! Experience the horrors of the Shock Tower
and the Pitt deep within the walls of Yoyodyne Propulsion
Systems as Buckaroo Banzai fights against impossible odds to
rescue Penny Priddy [Ellen Barkin] from the clutches of Dr.
Emilio Lizardo [John Lithgow], the diabolically alien dictator.
Pray that Buckaroo will succeed, knowing only too well that if
he fails the Earth itself will be blown to dust!"
The movie details all the above — and finds time to show Dr.
Banzai playing piano, guitar and trumpet in a Huey Lewis and the
News-ish rock band between exploits.
*
* *
III. Praise and criticism.
To its credit, Richter's film is nowhere near as wacky as the
above description would lead you to believe. The movie drops you
immediately into Banzai's goofy world — with no lumbering
exposition explaining, for example, why all the aliens are named
John, or why Buckaroo's scientist bandmates are all carrying
semiautomatic weapons onstage, or why the "good-guy" aliens in
human disguise all look and speak like Rastafarians, or why the
President of the United States (Ronald Lacey) is the mirror
image of Charles Foster Kane and spends the entire movie in a
rotating hospital bed (according to Richter on the commentary
track, POTUS has just had a painful rectal surgery). I actually
think this willful leaving-out of exposition is the reason the
movie developed such a rabid cluster of fans; geeks (including,
again, this reviewer) thrilled at filling in the blanks
themselves, or in reading Rauch's novelization to flesh out the
Banzai universe.
Richter's production designers and effects technicians further
this approach to the material, filling the screen with visual
jokes and weird little details. One personal favorite is the
effects shot of our heroes taking command of a "thermopod" as
they do battle with the airborne Dr. Lizardo; the spaceship is
funky and elegant, clearly modeled on seashell forms — but the
pod itself is hovering above an industrial district in urban New
Jersey. It's a dryly funny juxtaposition, a weird little grace
note, and indicative of the larger approach to Rauch's script.
The actors are equally unapologetic. Barkin, Weller, Jeff
Goldblum, Lewis Smith and the rest of Team Banzai all play their
characters utterly straight-faced — even when they're uttering
dialogue like "The deuce you say!" and wearing costumes that
look like what might result if Adam Ant's and Merle Haggard's
tour buses crashed into one another in 1982. Meanwhile, the evil
"Lectroid" aliens — played by extreme character actors
Christopher Lloyd, Dan Hedaya, and Vincent Schiavelli — snarl
with moronic relish, and are led by an utterly insane John
Lithgow, who invests his alien dictator with a corny Italian
accent that meshes perfectly with his Mussolini-esque rantings
("History is-a made at night! Character is-a what you are in the
dark!" and so forth).
Still, there are many, many valid criticisms to be made of
Buckaroo Banzai. The most valid is probably that the filmmakers
seem to have deliberately set out to make a "cult classic" —
which, if you're one of those people who thinks "cult classics"
are only made by accident, means the entire enterprise is sort
of artistically bankrupt from the get-go. Also, there's never
any real sense of danger or suspense — partly a result of the
flat staging, and also a natural casualty of the movie's
too-studied "offbeat" vibe.
In the end, it's entirely possible that most of the people who
revere Banzai to this day are more in love with the idea of the
movie — with the universe it hints at — than they are with the
movie itself. I know that's certainly the case with me; In fact,
I'm such a huge fan of Rauch's novelization — written from the
point of view of Team Banzai member Reno Nevada, and rich in
footnotes, digressions, silly, earnest detail and
tongue-in-cheek sentences — that I've come to see the movie as a
partially successful adaptation of its own novelization, if that
makes any sense.
*
* *
IV. So how about those extras?
Well, if you're part of BB's small but rabid fan base, this
DVD's burgeoning supplements play like the Buckaroo Banzai
Rosetta Stone — a sprawling, tongue-in-cheek, frequently
text-driven guide to the movie's universe. Again, all the extras
play/read as if Buckaroo Banzai actually exists, with the movie
itself being a sort of a middle-of-the-road docudrama
chronicling his exploits. Whether you find this conceit charming
or tiresome is, of course, purely subjective. I found it kind of
quietly hilarious — a perfect companion to the novelization.
First up is a commentary track featuring director W.D. Richter
and "Reno" — "Reno" being a member of Team Banzai in the film
and the fictional narrator of the Banzai novelization; on the
commentary track, Reno's pretty obviously Earl Mac Rauch in
disguise.
Because of the disc's Banzai-actually-exists conceit, this track
becomes a sort of labored role-playing — with Richter and the
muttering, grunting "Reno" referring to the film as a
"docudrama" and repeatedly insisting that the actors are
mimicking real-life members of the Banzai Institute and the duo
making up elaborate legal explanations as to why Rauch's name
appears on the byline of the novelization when "in fact" it was
written by Reno, and so on ad nauseam. As performed by two
non-actors, this all comes off as kind of silly — but if you're
willing to roll with it, there are a few treasures to be had.
Rauch — er, "Reno" — is pretty much useless, grunting
infrequently and almost monosyllabically at times; given the
florid prose that appears in the book and throughout the written
extras, all of it written by Rauch, this is actually pretty
disappointing. Fortunately, Richter is more than game, and
several behind-the-scenes tidbits emerge. We learn for example
that Lewis Smith, the actor who plays Perfect Tommy, is a
colorful, ambivalent chap who now runs a motel, and that
producer David Begelman was a colorful, incendiary figure who
thought he was producing a much more straightforward action
film. (According to Richter, who sounds simultaneously bemused
and bitter, Begelman threatened to shut down the film over Dr.
Banzai's bright-red eyeglasses, saying that action heroes don't
sport nimby-pimby eyewear.) We also learn that the film's
semi-infamous "watermelon" gag — in which two characters in the
middle of an action scene stop and discuss a mysteriously placed
melon in a laboratory — came about because Richter wanted to see
if his producer/enemy was even watching the dailies any more.
For my money, the best way to enjoy the commentary is to watch
it with the special subtitle track, "Pinky Carruther's Unknown
Facts," turned on — the effect is a bit like watching "Mystery
Science Theater 3000" with a joke-packed CNN tickertape
scrolling underneath. The "Unknown Facts" are essentially
fictional, pseudoscience-packed footnotes for the movie —
rectifying differences between the movie and novelization and
expanding on character biographies. We learn here, for example,
that Dr. Banzai took Einstein's brain with him in a briefcase
during his opening Jet Car ride; that Jeff Goldblum's ridiculous
cowboy outfit is inherited from his grandfather, a silent-movie
actor; that the good-guy aliens all look like Rastafarians
because they only landed on Jamaica while researching the
planet; that Buckaroo Banzai packs a pair of vintage Navy Colt
pistols; and that you can submit annual poetry-contest entries
to the official Banzai Institute Web site (which is, by the way,
marvelously detailed and well worth a visit).
Moving on to the other extras, we find an "Alternate Opening
with Jamie Lee Curtis," which is also viewable appended to the
main feature. Featuring expository narration by Rawhide (Clancy
Brown), this is fake home-movie footage of young Buckaroo with
his parents (one of them played by Curtis in a fright wig) that
climaxes with an explosive assassination that orphans our hero.
Then there's "Buckaroo Banzai Declassified," a 22-minute
"documentary" that splices 1984 Electronic Press Kit interviews
and model-shop visits with brand-new footage of W.D. Richter,
looking tweedy and well-preserved, talking about making the
"docudrama" and showcasing movie props "on loan" from the "real"
Banzai Institute, from which he says this new interview is being
conducted. I know, I know. Still, it's amusing to watch Weller,
Lithgow, and Barkin try to explain (in 1984) what the hell the
movie's going to be about.
Next up (and we're maybe halfway through the extras at this
point) are 14 deleted scenes taken from an old workprint, most
of them extended cuts of final scenes, viewable separately or
all in a lump. For the sake of expediency, I'm just going to
throw plot points and character names out here without
explanation:
1. "Backstage with the Cavaliers" features the Hong Kong
Cavaliers doing a "spectrographic analysis" on the creature
Buckaroo found attached to his Jet Car after flying through the
mountain; the joke here is that they're doing it while strapping
on guitars for their rock-n-roll gig at Artie's Artery. There's
also some jokey business with a nudie picture sneaked into the
spectro-analyzer;
2. "Penny's Troubles" features an extended cut of Barkin in the
nightclub during the just-interrupted concert, sobbing and
telling Buckaroo how she just lost her room at the Y;
3. "The Conference Begins" is a needless intro to the
overthruster press conference — featuring people milling around
and just generally showcasing how bereft of much-needed extras
the scene was to begin with;
4. "'Dr. Lizardo?'" also takes place during the press
conference, and features Dr. Banzai cattily referring to the
just-escaped Lizardo as an "old ugly snoot";
5. "'Give Me A Fix!'" features the evil Lectroid trio sucking on
a battery in their van, with John Bigbooté refusing a hit,
saying "No thanks, I'm driving";
6. "A Little Down" features, in a failed comic counterpoint, our
heroes lounging around the press-conference room, waiting for
Dr. Banzai to return from chasing the Lectroids who kidnapped
Dr. Hikita;
7. "'Therma-what?'" is about five seconds of extra chit-chat as
the Lectroid trio discusses the crashed alien spacecraft found
by the hunters;
8. "New Jersey Meets the Cavaliers" features Goldblum's
character meeting everyone in the Bunkhouse — Team Banzai's
upstairs nerve center — as our heroes try to hack into Yoyodyne
Propulsion Systems' database computer (nice touch: One of the
guys in the Bunkhouse asks, "Laying down some background vocals
tonight?" as our heroes enter the room);
9. "John Emdall" features Rosalind Cash's glamorous alien queen
responding directly to Perfect Tommy as Team Banzai views what
was previously thought to be a "recording" of her threatening to
blow up the planet;
10. "'Hanoi Xan?'" is a quiet moment between Banzai and Penny in
which he reveals that Xan — an arch-villain Priddy thought only
existed in Banzai comic books — exists in real life, and
furthermore killed Buckaroo's wife, Penny's twin sister;
11. "Penny Confronts Dr. Lizardo" features Penny mistakenly
assuming that Dr. Lizardo is Hanoi Xan, to Lizardo's (and, if
the scene has made final cut, the audience's) confusion;
12. "'Solve These Equations!'" is an extended cut of Lizardo
interrogating Dr. Banzai in the Shock Tower — followed by an
absolutely terrible bit in which Secretary of Defense McKinley
(Matt Clark) screams bug-eyed at Team Banzai and commandeers
their bus;
13. "'A Piece of Cake'" contains some gun-exchanging business
between New Jersey, Buckaroo, and Perfect Tommy as they rescue
Penny Priddy from the "torture cradle";
14. And "Illegal Aliens" features Reno telling Buckaroo after
the climactic battle that they should imprison the remaining
Lectroids as illegal immigrants — with Buckaroo responding, "And
let the American taxpayers foot the bill? No way, Jose!"
All of the above scenes were cut for sound reasons, by the way.
Next up is the "New Jet Car Trailer" (2:24), created in late
1998 by Foundation Imaging to help pitch a "Buckaroo Banzai" TV
series. It's a swift bit of computer-generated mayhem —
featuring a radio-station tower shooting electricity into the
heavens, alien ships chasing the Jet Car over snowy terrain, and
the Jet Car literally acting as nose landing gear for a damaged
Space Shuttle as it makes an emergency landing in the desert.
According to Richter on the commentary track, the shifting
ownership of the "Banzai" property put this TV project in
development hell; perhaps this DVD's copious, imaginative extras
(and, one hopes, its strong sales) will give the series another
shot.
Moving along, we find some "Enhanced NUON Features" and a
"Teaser Trailer" — the latter playing up both the film's wacky
comedy and its oh-so-'80s end-credit shots of Team Banzai
walking around in the reservoir (with a special emphasis for
some reason on crotch shots of Goldblum and Weller). There's
also a "Photo Gallery" divided into 10 sections: "1930s,"
"1950s," "Behind the Scenes," "Buckaroo," "Hong Kong Cavaliers,"
"Jet Car," "Lectroids," "Penny," "Scenes," and "Villains."
Sick of this disc yet? We're just getting to the interesting
parts — the text-driven supplements, presumably written by
Rauch, a few of them lifted from the novelization, that explain
the world of the Banzai Institute in deadpan, obsessive,
excruciating, and — if you warm to Rauch's particular
tongue-in-cheek style — hilarious detail.
Allow me to showcase a few examples.
First up, there's the "Buckaroo Banzai Personal Profiles" menu,
which showcases a mini-biography of Banzai in five parts: "The
Musician," "The Lover," "The Scientist," "The Man," and "The
Adventurer." Text from "The Adventurer" section kicked off this
review; here's text from "The Lover":
"The principles by which B. Banzai lives are known as the Five
Stresses, the Four Beauties and the Three Loves. Things to be
stresses are decorum, courtesy, public health, discipline and
morals. The Four Beauties are the beauties of mind, language,
behavior and environment. The Three Loves are love of others,
love of justice and love of freedom."
Uh-huh. And that's just the opening salvo in an overwhelming
outpouring of pulpy imaginative text. Rauch goes on in the next
section, "Buckaroo Banzai Character Profiles," to offer
mini-biographies of Banzai (again) and 13 other characters —
Reno Nevada, New Jersey, Dr. Emilio Lizardo, Lord John Whorfin,
Rawhide, Penny Priddy, Perfect Tommy, Pinky Carruthers (played
in the movie, I might add, by Billy Vera of Billy & The
Beaters), John Parker, Lo Pep, Hanoi Xan ("a.k.a. The Scourge of
Burma, The Spawn of Hell, The Face That Is No Face"), Lectroids,
and Toichi Hikita. A couple of these characters don't even
appear in the movie (though they do show up in the book) — which
leads me to believe the bios were probably pulled from the
TV-series pitch materials.
From the profile of Buckaroo Banzai in this section:
"... Dr. Banzai became dissatisfied with a life devoted
exclusively to medicine and perfected a wide range of skills. It
was quite by chance that he became involved in scientific
investigation, first studying the psychology of crime. Although
he was born in London while his parents were visiting England,
he spent his early days on the vast ranges of Colorado and
Arizona and was taught how to ride and shoot by the redskinned
Sioux warriors, who strangely seemed to enjoy showing an
Amerasian boy their tricks. Until he was fourteen he went to
school in Denver, and later continued his education in
Massachusetts, Texas and England, taking his medical degree from
Harvard. In this way a love of travel and the craving for
excitement and danger were stimulated in him from childhood."
And here's my personal favorite, Rauch's profile of Perfect
Tommy:
"Upon his introduction into the Hong Kong Cavaliers (at a
surprisingly young age), this accomplished guitarist and
Institute fellow who would one day design the amazing Jet Car
was nicknamed by Buckaroo, 'Perfect Tommy, Knight of the Lesser
Boulevards.' A native of Lincoln County, New Mexico (Billy the
Kid territory), and the son of a Scotch emigrant, Tommy is
related on his mother's side to the historian Robertson, and to
Lord Brougham.
"His youth evinced neither capacity nor application, but was
passed in telling stories, hunting, and in fiddling. Having
failed as a store-keeper, he was admitted to the State Bar after
six weeks of study, with an admonition from the court to
overcome his ignorance of the law. Only in matters affecting the
Bill of Rights, and as a jury lawyer, was he roused to the
exhibition of talent; and the traditions of his eloquence far
surpass the impressions made by reading such of his speeches as
the labor of his friends at the Banzai Archives has preserved."
The only drawback to these particular supplements is that you
wish more of this stuff had actually made it into the movie.
Next up is "Jet Car All Access" — more reams of obsessively
detailed text, supposedly from a newly declassified Auto
Enthusiast magazine article, about the inner workings of Dr.
Banzai's mountain-piercing pickup. Subsections include
"Statistics," "Jet Engine," "Cockpit," "Overthruster" (which
comprises further subsections containing 23 pages worth of
"Designs/Drawings" and "Mathematics") and, finally, "Design."
Finally — finally — we reach the "Banzai Institute Archives,"
containing the following subsections:
• "Technical Data," including schematics [read:
production-design drawings] of the Hong Kong Cavaliers tour bus
and Complex 88;
• "Movie Archive," featuring "Movie Tie-Ins," "Film
Locations," and "Movie Reviews" from the New York Times and
Hollywood Reporter (the latter a mixed-to-negative writeup);
• "Hong Kong Cavaliers CD Covers," featuring such album
titles as "Your Place or Mayan?" and "Progress Over Protocol" (a
record on which, according to the album's song list, Stephen
Hawking contributes guest vocals);
• And "Historical Archives," including a "Buckaroo Banzai
Interview" ported over from the official Web site; a 10-minute
"Banzai Radio" broadcast in which Terry "Silver Fox" Erdman is
interviewed by Denise "Catnip" Okuda about promoting the film,
among other issues; an "Institute History" taken largely from
the novelization; a "Badges" section featuring three
security/backstage tags; and "Hikita's Diary," which rounds out
the DVD with an obsessive, multiple-page collection of anecdotes
about Banzai's parents and the events leading up to their
murder.
*
* *
V. Any Easter Eggs?
I found five, though there may be more:
• In the main menu, highlight the center Jet Car on the
top of the screen; you'll access a menu of "Quotes" from Dr.
Banzai and, yes, Aristotle;
• Also in the main menu, highlight the upper-left console
button to view 36 stills of alternate DVD menu screens;
• On the first page of the deleted-scenes menu, highlight
the watermelon; you'll access a faux newspaper article titled
"Food From the Skies?" about the Banzai Institute's efforts to
develop air-droppable watermelons;
• Then there's an Easter Egg inside an Easter Egg:
Highlight the "BB" logo on page two of the watermelon article,
and you access a short interview clip (titled "Why?") in which
Richter discusses New Jersey's recipe for "Chicken in a
Watermelon";
• And finally, highlight the "BB" logo on the "Banzai
Institute Archives" page to access alternate DVD cover designs,
all of which are less lurid than the one they actually used.
That is all. Good Lord, it should be plenty.
— Alexandra DuPont
dupont@dvdjournal.com
• Color
• Anamorphic widescreen (2.35:1)
• Dolby Digital 5.1 (English), Dolby Digital 2.0 mono (French)
• French and Spanish subtitles
• Commentary track featuring director W.D. Richter and "Reno"
(i.e., screenwriter Earl Mac Rauch)
• Subtitle track: "Pinky Carruther's Unknown Facts"
• Alternate opening sequence
• Making-of documentary: "Buckaroo Banzai Declassified"
• 14 deleted scenes
• "New Jet Car Trailer" for proposed Banzai TV series
• Enhanced NUON features
• Teaser trailer
• Buckaroo Banzai "Personal Profiles"
• Character profiles
• "Jet Car All Access" article
• Photo gallery
• "Banzai Institute Archives," featuring technical data, Hong
Kong Cavaliers CD covers, interviews, reviews, and much more
• Five Easter eggs
• Keep-case
This review from the DVDReview website (http://www.dvdreview.com)
can be found at http://www.dvdreview.com/2002/01/adventures-of-buckaroo-banzai-across-the-8th-dimension-the/
and was posted on 1/4/02.
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension
Reviewed on January 4, 2002 by Michael Pflug in DVD, Reviews //
0 Comments
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension
(1984)
MGM Home Entertainment
Cast: Peter Weller, Ellen Barkin, John Lithgow, Christopher
Lloyd
Extras: Commentary Track, Subtitle Track, Documentary, Alternate
Opening, Deleted Scenes, Trailers and More
"The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension"
surely ranks as one of the classic cult movies of all time. This
insanely great little film has carved out a nice little niche
for itself due solely to word of mouth by the rabid fans who
refuse to let a good movie die. While the film was well received
by the handful of critics who "got it, " I can just imagine how
the average theater-goer responded to this one-of-a-kind
cinematic experience. I myself missed this gem during its very
limited theatrical run but I quickly fell under its sway when I
later rented the VHS tape on a whim. I imagine that many
"Buckaroo Banzai" fans followed the same path to enlightenment
and those who have never seen the film in all its <$PS,
widescreen> glory (it has never before been released in
<$PS, widescreen> on any home video format) are certainly
in for a treat with this jam-packed special edition courtesy of
the Banzai Institute and the fine folks at MGM.
Buckaroo Banzai (Peter Weller) is a
scientist/musician/surgeon/well, you get the idea by now, who
finds himself engaged in numerous very important pursuits with
his band (I’m talking the real music-playing kind of band here)
of compatriots The Hong Kong Cavaliers.
The film opens with Dr. Banzai rushing from his stint as a
neurosurgeon just in time to pilot the first test drive of a
supersonic Jet Car. Unbeknownst to the project’s
government-appointed handlers, Buckaroo Banzai and his life-long
mentor Professor Hikita (Robert Ito) are secretly planning to
recreate the very test that killed Buckaroo’s parents many years
earlier.
Planting an Oscillation Overthruster in the vehicle, Banzai sets
out to take the car and himself into the 8th dimension. Banzai
and the car both pass through a mountain relatively unharmed but
this brief foray into 8D awakens the Red Lectroids who have been
imprisoned there after a failed coup against their Black
Lectroid brethren on Planet 10.
The last man to venture into the 8th dimension was Hikita’s
partner Dr. Emilio Lizardo (John Lithgow) who seemingly went mad
in the attempt. In actuality, Lizardo’s body was possessed by
the leader of the Reds, Lord John Whorfin (all of the aliens are
named John) who now sets out after Banzai to steal the
Overthruster, release the rest of his army, and seek revenge
against his home planet.
Can Buckaroo Banzai and his gang stop Lord Whorfin in time? Will
the Black Lectroids be forced to start World War Three in order
to annihilate their Red enemies? Is Penny Priddy (Ellen Barkin)
really the long lost twin sister of Banzai’s departed wife? All
these questions and many more you never thought to ask are
answered in "The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th
Dimension."
That’s really the best I can do by way of a plot synopsis as the
storyline really defies explanation and just has to be seen to
be believed. Modeled after the Saturday morning matinee serials
that were a staple of the all-American childhood up until the
1950s, "Buckaroo Banzai" plays out in frenetic fashion and
assumes that viewers will not only be able to keep up but that
they are also in the know with regards to any background
information. For this reason, the film feels like the middle
episode in a series (alas, the follow-up film promised in the
end credits never came to pass) so don’t be alarmed if nothing
seems to make sense the first time through.
Writer Earl Mac Rauch and director W.D. Richter have created a
comic book come to life and the only other film that comes close
to approximating the dialogue, pacing, and almost outlandish
seriousness of "Buckaroo Banzai" is that other mid-1980s cult
classic, John Carpenter’s "Big Trouble in Little China." Of
course the fact that W. D. Richter was involved with both films
may have something to do with their similarity in tone. If
you’ve seen "Big Trouble" and liked it then "Buckaroo Banzai" is
most certainly your cup of tea.
"The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension" is
presented for the first time ever on home video in its original
2.35:1 <$PS,widescreen> aspect ratio. That alone should be
enough to get fans of the movie all giddy but the fact that this
brand-new <$16x9,anamorphic> transfer is virtually perfect
comes as a very welcome surprise. The image is much sharper than
I’ve ever seen it without resorting to any heavy-handed edge
enhancement. In addition, the vast majority of physical defects
and blemishes have been removed leaving an almost pristine
picture. There is a constant degree of fine film grain but that
is inherent in the source elements and doesn’t detract from the
image.
Colors are very vibrant and I do mean very as scenes featuring
New Jersey’s bright red cowboy shirt are almost painful to
watch. But at no time does even that harsh color ever bloom or
bleed. A few scenes suffer from faded colors but all in all the
palette is quite consistent. Black levels are good as well with
the many dark interiors showing up in fine detail. This new
video transfer is a real winner offering up a beautifully
rendered <$PS,widescreen> image.
Audio is presented in a new English <$DD,Dolby Digital>
<$5.1,5.1 mix> as well as a mono French dubbed track. The
new 5.1 track doesn’t try to do too much with the original
stereo source elements so purists shouldn’t find much to object
to. Dialogue is firmly anchored to the center speaker with the
rest of the front speakers used to open up the musical score and
sound effects. Surrounds are used to good effect and never sound
intrusive. Dynamic range is somewhat limited but there is a bit
of deep bass here and there and no noticeable distortion. All
elements of the soundtrack are well-balanced and the end result
is an engaging but non-obtrusive audio experience.
"The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension" is
presented on DVD as a full-blown special edition and the
creation of this disc was an obvious labor of love. But be
forewarned, just as the movie itself always plays it straight,
so too do the numerous bonus features. Everything from the
director’s commentary to the behind-the-scenes documentary play
up the angle that Buckaroo Banzai is in fact a real-life hero
and that this film was merely a biopic of his life. From
beginning to end this DVD is one big inside joke that fans will
find delightful but more casual viewers will likely just find
confusing.
First up is a <$commentary,commentary track> with director
W.D. Richter and writer Earl Mac Rauch who takes on the persona
of Team Banzai member Reno Nevada. In keeping with the overall
theme of the disc, the commentary offers some insight into the
filming of the feature but really focuses on enhancing the
Buckaroo Banzai mythology by offering up numerous tidbits
regarding the famed adventurer and his pals. From beginning to
end the track is deadpan serious and will either be a real hoot
or just plain annoying depending on the level of fandom of the
listener.
In addition to the commentary there is also a subtitle track
filled with further factoids about Team Banzai. Presented as
"Pinky Carruthers’ Unknown Facts," this subtitle stream offers
up even more essential Banzai info from Pinky, the Keeper of the
47,000 Unknown Facts.
Next is the film’s alternate opening which offers up some much
needed background information about Buckaroo Banzai’s childhood
and the death of his parents. Presented as home movie footage
and featuring Jamie Lee Curtis as Buckaroo’s mom, this short
introduction can be accessed by watching the extended version of
the film or by selecting this feature from the special features
menu. Die-hard fans are likely to turn up their noses at this
attempt to offer the audience some small degree of background
information but I for one like the bit and appreciate the
effort.
"Buckaroo Banzai Declassified" is a new 22-minute documentary
which opens with some vintage interview snippets with the cast
and crew. But the bulk of the feature revolves around a
present-day interview with W.D. Richter which takes place at the
Banzai Institute. This is a decent enough feature and offers a
wealth of behind-the-scenes information without the director
ever once slipping out of character.
Next up are 14 deleted scenes culled from the original
workprint. These are rough extensions of existing scenes and,
while of some interest, really don’t amount to much.
The film’s original teaser trailer (really just the end credit
sequence without the text) and what’s billed as a "New Jet Car
Trailer" are also presented. The Jet Car trailer is a CGI teaser
meant to promote the supposed Buckaroo Banzai television series
which has yet to go into production.
Next are Buckaroo Banzai Personal and Character Profiles
providing some zany background info on Dr. Banzai and the
members of Team Banzai. Again, in keeping with the nature of the
disc, no mention of the actors or their filmographies is made
anywhere on the DVD.
"Jet Car All Access" offers up some technical info and images of
the Jet Car while the "Photo Gallery" presents a whole slew of
production stills.
Rounding out the bountiful bonus features is the "Banzai
Institute Archives." This catch-all feature includes promotional
and marketing materials such as previous home video cover art,
computer game packaging, the covers of the original and newly
re-released paperback books, a radio interview, text reviews of
the movie (by film critics who very much "got it"), and much
more.
The disc also contains some Nuon features for those with
supporting DVD players but I’m not able to access that
functionality so you’re on your own.
Not only is "The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th
Dimension" a packed special edition, it is also a DVD squarely
targeted at the film’s core legion of fans. While casual viewers
will be greatly confused by the "serious" tone of the
supplemental materials, those who know and love Buckaroo Banzai
are in for a real treat as this disc is for them and them alone.
MGM is to be commended for going all out on this DVD. The new
<$PS,widescreen> transfer is a sight to behold, the new
5.1 soundtrack is solid, and the extras are wonderfully insane.
This DVD was created by fans for fans and the rest of the world
can just lump it. I hesitate to give "Buckaroo Banzai" a blanket
recommendation as I hazard to guess that the majority of the
populace will not like, understand, or appreciate this cult
classic. But fans of the film, and those who seem likely to fall
under its spell, are in for a real treat and one of the best
presentations of a 1980s cult movie to appear on DVD.
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