Road Trip: 25th Anniversary Edition - 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray

Josh (Breckin Meyer) has a lot of problems lately. You see, he’s dating this girl, Tiffany, and they’ve been together since they were kids. But lately they’ve been drifting apart ever since they went to college, and they’ve been doing the whole long-distance thing. Unable to get a hold of her, and egged on by some bad advice from his friends, Josh sleeps with another girl. That very next day, Tiffany calls him and explains she’s been MIA because of a death in the family. Womp-womp. And uh-oh, it turns out Josh made a sex tape and his idiot friend accidentally mailed it to Tiffany! Josh has to travel from Ithaca, NY, all the way to Austin, TX, to retrieve the tape before she watches it, and everything is ruined! Along for the ride are his buddies: E.L., played by Seann William Scott, who is basically playing just a slight variation on Stiffler from American Pie. There’s also Rubin (Paulo Costanzo), a genius who sometimes lacks common sense. And Kyle (DJ Qualls), a sheltered nerd who needs to hit the road to experience life before it passes him by.

Road Trip is pleasant enough as brainless escapism, but it never fully comes together. So much of it feels half-hearted. The characters are barely-there cutouts, and the gags themselves don’t quite land, as a result. The only character who has anything resembling an arc, or a trajectory, is Kyle. Throughout the course of the journey, he gains confidence, he learns the joys of life, and for the first time in his life, he rebels. He rebels against his parents. He rebels against himself, even redefining himself along the way. Josh, our main character, is so painfully boring, he lacks any kind of fundamental transformation as a result of the story. It's a shame because Breckin Meyer is a funny actor, given the right material. A better movie would have switched his and Kyle's journeys. E.L., the goofy horndog, remains a goofy horndog. Rubin stays exactly the same, from beginning to end. So, when we get close to a gag that might be funny, in which our quartet jumps a car over a broken bridge, only for it to fall apart and explode on the other side, it doesn’t ever quite get the laughs it deserves, because I don’t care enough about the characters to have any sort of investment into the story or its various detours through disaster.

A much funnier movie understands, too, that something raunchy isn’t funny by itself. A bodily function is a cheap gag. Take, for instance, the scene in Dumb & Dumber where Jeff Daniels’ character has explosive diarrhea. The diarrhea isn’t the joke. It’s a setup to a much funnier gag, as we come to find out the toilet is broken, and he can’t flush. The joke isn’t how funny it is to have to take an emergency dump; it’s the shock and horror of realizing you’ll be caught after laying waste to someone’s bathroom and that there will be no way to dispose of it. So, when Seann William Scott comes to find he enjoys a certain sex act, there’s nothing beyond it other than that. There’s no humor beyond it merely existing.

As a story, Road Trip is unsatisfying because it has so little interest in its characters. As a comedy, it spins its wheels without ever searching for the root of what actually makes something funny. Road Trip is the kind of movie you can have on in the background while you fold laundry or vacuum the living room. It’s not bad, per se, it’s just also not particularly good. It takes place in a sort of purgatory of quality, inhabiting no extremes on either end of mediocrity.

Vital Disc Stats: The 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray
Road Trip rides into 4K UHD Blu-ray from Kino Lorber Studio Classics in a two-disc release. The first disc contains the theatrical cut of the film in 4K/Dolby Vision, while the second Blu-ray disc contains both the theatrical cut and extended version in 1080p HD. The two discs are housed in a standard case with a removable slipcover containing identical cover artwork from its previous theatrical and home video releases.

Here's something I wasn’t expecting: Road Trip looks great. Like, not great compared to other movies of its type, but genuinely a really good-looking flick. And this release really benefits from the 4K treatment, as it’s been restored from its original 35mm camera negative, then graded in Dolby Vision HDR.

The cinematographer for Road Trip was Mark Irwin, and I remember having the same reaction when I saw his work in Kingpin, restored in 4K. He previously lensed pictures for David Cronenberg, like The Fly and Videodrome, and he brings his A-game to everything he works on, it seems. The color realization and the lighting both work together in unison to create a very natural look. Details are sharp and clearly defined, with excellent contrast, but something about how it all comes together looks incredible. It’s less like you’re watching a movie, and more like you’re watching something play out through a window before you, catching a glimpse into some wildly improbable story. A slight layer of film grain is visible throughout the presentation, maintaining a distinct filmic look.

Listeners have the option between a 5.1 surround option and a 2.0 stereo option, both encoded in DTS-HD MA. Both options are a winners, depending on the kind of equipment you have at home, and there’s not a tremendous difference between the two. The surround option and the stereo option both favor dialogue in the mix, but can pack a punch when a song is blasting over the soundtrack while we’re on the road, or during a bit where a car explodes in a ball of fire. The surround option sees some infrequent rear speaker activity, mostly in bleed-over from songs playing on the front of the soundstage, and the occasional obvious effect like screeching tires.

Road Trip has some nice features packed along for the ride—most of which are legacy features, but it does include a newly-recorded audio commentary track, plus the extended, unrated version of the film in HD on the Blu-ray disc.

4K Disc

• Audio Commentary - Hats Off Entertainment's Joe Ramoni

Blu-ray Disc

• Audio Commentary - Hats Off Entertainment's Joe Ramoni
• Even Been on a Road Trip (SD 4:55) - Behind-the-Scenes Featurette
• Eels Music Video (SD 3:53)
• Road Kill: Deleted Scenes (SD 10:54)
• Trailers

As a connoisseur of so-called brainless comedies of the era, it pains me when I see one as lifeless as Road Trip, a movie that seems to be checking off a list of items required to just barely be a movie, and just barely qualify as a comedy. It’s going through the motions. And while it’s not necessarily bad, it feels more like a spare than a genuine part. Still, Kino Lorber’s work, as always, is excellent, providing Road Trip with an amazing film transfer and a pair of great audio tracks in DTS-HD MA. Road Trip is Worth a Look.