Tommy Boy: Steelbook - 4K Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Tommy Boy: Steelbook Edition



Movie:
4K Video:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:

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Movie
Holy Schnikes!

The 80s and 90s were a thing of wonder. Sometimes I go back and wonder if we’ll ever reach the heights of comedy that those two decades dared to give us. Maybe it’s me being an 80s and 90s child growing up, or perhaps it’s just that you can’t capture lightning in a bottle twice. But whatever the reason, I still get excited as a 15-year-old every time Tommy Boy comes on TV. It was right at the height of Chris Farley’s career, and pretty much everything he did at the time became box office magic. 15 year old me didn’t see his untimely death 2 years later, and when it happened my senior year, I remember breaking out the old VHS of Tommy Boy and Black Sheep to commemorate his passing. 28 years later, I’m still grabbing my faithful (if not mediocre-looking) Blu-ray disc to get a few chuckles on a Saturday night. Only now, we get a great looking 4K UHD upgrade to boost it into the next generation formats.

Tommy Callahan (Chris Farley) is a career slacker, graduating college at the ripe old age of 25 (after 7 years of trying not to fail), and coming home to his father’s auto parts manufacturing plant in hopes of figuring out what to do for the future. His old man (Brian Dennehey, may he RIP) is getting ready to groom him to take over for him (god help them all), but Tommy is more focused on smashing beer kegs and picking his nose to really be appropriate. However, after his father decides to marry the beautiful Beverly (Bo Derek) things go sideways. Papa Dearest keels over from heart failure at the alter, only for Beverly to take the remaining shares of the company and try and sell the company to Ray Zalinsky (Dan Aykroyd), the nation's largest auto parts distributor, in hopes of making a hefty profit. To make matters worse, they’re in over their head with the bank after Tommy’s Father leveraged the company to get funding to produce revolutionary new brake pads. This left them high and dry with no capital before the production could get off the ground.

Desperate to save his father’s company, Tommy puts up his shares of the fortune as collateral to the bank and heads off on a road trip with his father’s second in command, Richard (David Spade), as they attempt to drum up new business with their partners to get the capital needed. Only thing is, Tommy and Richard are about as opposites as oil and water, so even if they DO get the money needed they very well may kill each other before that can happen. Not to mention Beverly and her son (played by Rob Lowe) are not exactly all they appear either. But hey, it’s the 90s! All that’s needed is a quick wit, slapstick humor, and things will turn out OK in the end.

Tommy Boy is peak David Farley and David Spade fun. The duo was famous for playing off of each other in their movies (though everyone loves to rib David Spade that Farley carried his career for him) and the duo are firing on all 4 cylinders here. Richard is the nerdy and unlikable ying to Tommy’s irresponsible and oafish yang, allowing the two to riff off each other the entire film. As a film, it’s not perfect, but it still manages to be hilarious. Like most of Farleys movies, things turn out a bit TOO well for him, and I kept looking back and wondering just what could have been if they had played things a bit tighter and more realistic. That being said, the film is a time bubble to a period where comedies were big, crazy, and actually, one of the biggest box office pulls (nowadays comedies barely bring butts into seats anymore). Farley is rock solid, Spade is the same douchebag he always plays, and it doesn’t hurt that Bo Derek pretty much had every male’s jaw on the floor at that infamous bikini scene.




Rated PG-13 for sex-related humor, some drug content and nudity




4K Video: Video:

Paramount’s new 4K treatments are a very VERY solid upgrade over the aging Blu-ray. Said Blu-ray was notorious for being an over-processed and underwhelming “meh” back in the day, AND was in the incorrect 1.78:1 aspect ratio. Luckily for us most of those problems are no longer with us, and Paramount framed it in the correct aspect ratio for the first time since the DVD release. All this aside, the new 4K disc looks quite nice. It’s got a very autumn-colored hue, with amber colors and a slightly boosted contrast. As is the case with many 80s and 90s comedies, the film will look slightly soft, but not at the expense of too much detail. The film looks great in that regard, showing us more detail levels than we’ve ever seen before in the film. Black levels are probably the most improved over the Blu-ray, with inky deep shadows and rich coloring coming through. The grain is still solid, though I’m pretty sure that Paramount used at least a modicum of some DNR variant on the picture, as I swore the original 35mm print I saw 20 years ago had a good bit more grain. That being said, this is no Planes, Trains, and Automobiles abortion here. This is a nice-looking image that will fairly handily blow the old Blu-ray out of the water.







Audio:

Tommy Boy sports the same 5.1 Dolby TrueHD track from the ancient Blu-ray, and I’m not even mad about it. Unlike many of the old 80s and 90s comedies that came out at the beginning of the Blu-ray format, this wasn’t butchered and thin-sounding. The mix is not going to shock and awe you, but it’s a very stable and clean front-heavy comedic mix. There’s not a whole ton of bass, nor is there amazing sound usage. But the bones of the audio are rock solid. Great dialog representation up in the front of the room, and the surrounds get a moderate workout with the score and some discrete sound effects (mainly in the form of car crashes, deer screams, and other various hijinks that Chris and David get into on their sales trip). All in all, this is a nice mix that isn’t going to win awards but fits right as a comedy during that mid-90s time period.







Extras:

• Audio Commentary by director Peter Segal
•Featurettes:
-- Tommy Boy: Behind the Laughter
-- Stories from the Side of the Road
-- Just the Two of Us
-- Growing Up Farley
•Storyboard Comparisons
•Deleted and Extended Scenes
•Alternate Takes
•Gag Reel
•Photo Gallery
•TV Spots
•Theatrical Trailer

Final Score: ​

Growing up in the 90s this was the quintessential comedy for high school me. Chris Farley was at the peak of his career, and David Spade was coming with him. Sadly our enjoyment was cut short due to Farley’s tragic death, but Tommy Boy will always hold a place in my heart for the stupid slapstick comedy that it was for this 90s teen. The 4K UHD disc sports a great new encode for the aging (and rather mediocre) Blu-ray, but the extras are simple ports of said 1080p disc and the audio is the same as well. Fans of the movie will definitely want the new video encode though, as it's night and day better than what we’ve had to deal with for the last decade or so. Solid buy in my opinion.


Technical Specifications:

Starring: Chris Farley, David Spade, Brian Dennehey, Rob Lowe, Bo Derek
Directed by: Peter Segal
Written by: Bonnie Turner, Terry Turner
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 HEVC
Audio: English: Dolby TrueHD 5.1, Spanish DD 5.1, French DD 2.0
Subtitles: English SDH, English, French, Spanish
Studio: Paramount
Rated: PG-13
Runtime: 97 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: March 25th, 2025

Recommendation: Solid Buy

 

[Todd Anderson]

LOVE THIS MOVIE. One of my top 5 favorite comedies of all time. Not so much because it's a brilliant movie, but totally because it's silly, features the legend that is Chris Farley, and I have such great memories of watching it with friends in college... then repeat watching on VHS.

Classic!

 

[Michael Scott]

LOVE THIS MOVIE. One of my top 5 favorite comedies of all time. Not so much because it's a brilliant movie, but totally because it's silly, features the legend that is Chris Farley, and I have such great memories of watching it with friends in college... then repeat watching on VHS.

Classic!

Black Sheep is my go to farley movie, but this is a close second.

 

[Todd Anderson]

That's another classic. His last?

 

[Michael Scott]

That's another classic. His last?

no, that was Almost Heroes ... Black Sheep came in between Tommy Boy and Almost Heroes with Almost Heroes being the one where he died just before it released

 

[Todd Anderson]

Ah... I don't think I've seen Almost Heroes. Worth a watch?