Tommy Boy, 1995.
Directed by Peter Segal.
Starring Chris Farley, David Spade, Bo Derek, and Rob Lowe.
SYNOPSIS:
Paramount has issued 1995’s Tommy Boy, starring Chris Farley, David Spade, Bo Derek, and Rob Lowe, in a new 4K Ultra HD edition that also includes a Blu-ray with the movie and the legacy bonus features, along with a code for a digital copy. The movie looks great, as you’d expect, and while the studio didn’t commission any new extras, what you’ll find here is plenty for a film like this one.
I miss Chris Farley. As a Gen Xer, he was a big part of my 20s, when I was watching Saturday Night Live pretty much every week. In an era before social media and YouTube, it was a must-watch show for me, even when I was living in California and viewing the time-delayed airing. After all, if something goofy happened while it was airing live, you didn’t really know until you watched it on the west coast.
I’ve often wondered what path Farley’s career would have taken had he not died in 1997. Would he have been capable of the kind of more serious roles that guys like Jim Carrey and John Belushi (another tragic loss, of course) were able to take on and do well? I think so. There was, of course, a raw vulnerability underneath that thick shell of over-the-top physical acting, and I think it would have served him well had he lived to see the rest of his 30s and into his 40s and beyond.
Which brings me to Tommy Boy, the 1995 film starring him and his fellow SNL alum David Spade. The plot is pretty simple: Farley is Tommy Callahan III, the dim-witted but well-meaning son of a business owner (Brian Dennehy) who has the weight of leadership dumped on him when his father dies.
Spade is Richard Hayden, who knows Tommy from childhood and is a by-the-book, stand-up guy working for Callahan Auto. Needless to say, he’s not a fan of Tommy, but “Big Tom” Callahan’s death pairs him with the owner’s son as the two try to save the business from being bought by Tommy’s widowed stepmother (Bo Derek) and a man presented as his stepbrother (Rob Lowe).
And, yes, there’s a convenient love interest for Tommy in the form of Callahan employee Michelle Brock (Julie Warner), who also knows him from childhood. As you might imagine, this is a movie with a pretty predictable plot and a nice feel-good message at the end, but it’s the chemistry between Spade and Farley that has elevated it in the 28 years since its underwhelming box office performance. They’re simply another variant on an odd couple, of course, but they’re still a lot of fun to watch.
The story doesn’t hang together as well as I wanted it to, and some of the bits simply weren’t funny to me (there’s also one moment in particular that’s very cringe-worthy in today’s climate, as it should be), but I can see why Tommy Boy has achieved a cult status on home video during the past three decades.
This new 4K Ultra HD edition of the film from Paramount is billed as a 30th Anniversary Edition and my understanding is that it’s available in three different packages. My review copy arrived as a handsome yellow SteelBook that also includes a Blu-ray and a code for a digital copy.
The studio didn’t create any new extras for this release, but what you’ll find here is adequate. You can argue that a tribute to Chris Farley should have been created (and I would agree with you), but maybe that’s planned for another 4K Ultra HD release, especially if this one sells well.
The bonus features kick off with a commentary track featuring director Peter Segal, which is a nice little discussion of the film. Yes, sometimes he just watches the movie and laughs, but he still has plenty of info to offer.
Next up is a quartet of featurettes: Tommy Boy: Behind the Laughter (29:08) is a nice little making-of (sure, I love meaty documentaries, but I don’t know that this film needs one); Stories From the Side of the Road (13:31) digs into the road trip aspect of the movie, which obviously has some of the same hallmarks as Planes, Trains and Automobiles; Just the Two of Us (9:46) examines the relationship between Farley and Spade, who were very good friends off camera; and Growing Up Farley (7:29) is a bittersweet piece in which Chris’s brothers, John and Kevin, look back on their childhood with him.
You also get storyboard-to-scene comparisons that run almost 14 minutes and compare seven scenes, a little over 30 minutes of deleted, extended, and alternate scenes (lots of fun stuff in there since Farley and Spade did plenty of improvisational takes), a photo gallery, a gag reel, several TV ads, and the theatrical trailer.
Now that I’m done writing all that out, yeah, that’s plenty for this edition.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★
Brad Cook
