Before he was the international man of mystery, SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE alumnus Mike Myers made the jump to the big screen with WAYNE’S WORLD ($30). Not straying too far from the nest, WAYNE’S WORLD takes the SNL characters portrayed by Myers and Dana Carvey and allows them break out of the confinement of a single set for a big screen comedy adventure. However, the difference between WAYNE’S WORLD and a bunch of other SNL screen projects is the fact that this movie is genuinely funny and prove to be a huge success at the box office.

In WAYNE’S WORLD, Myers and Carvey embody Wayne Campbell and Garth Algar- two suburban heavy metal head-bangers that still live at home with their parents. I think most people from my generation either know or went to school with guys like Wayne and Garth, with one small difference- Wayne and Garth star in Wayne’s World, their own public access television show produced out of their parent’s basement. The aforementioned public access television show is at the center of WAYNE’S WORLD the movie, with its hosts making the jump to the big time, when oily producer Benjamin Oliver (Rob Lowe) expresses an interest in putting their show on a real cable network. As Wayne’s profession fortunes see an upturn, so does his personal life, when he meets a beautiful rock goddess named Cassandra (Tia Carrere), whom is determined to make his. For the most part WAYNE’S WORLD is a good-natured film that is filled with bits of insanely brilliant comedy. Myers and Carvey really shine in the material, plus Tia Carrere is, to quote our hero, a real "babe" and makes the film even more pleasant to watch. The cast of WAYNE’S WORLD also includes Brian Doyle-Murray, Lara Flynn Boyle, Michael DeLuise, Colleen Camp, Donna Dixon, Chris Farley, Meat Loaf, Alice Cooper and the ever-brilliant Ed O'Neill.

Paramount Home Entertainment has made WAYNE’S WORLD available on DVD in a 1.78:1 wide screen presentation that features the anamorphic enhancement for 16:9 displays. Paramount provides WAYNE’S WORLD with a really nice transfer that makes this modestly budgeted comedy shine. The image on the DVD is sharp and well defined- appearing superior to all previous video incarnations. Colors tend to be fairly vibrant and the flesh tones are appealing. There is a lot of colored lighting in the film; none of which causes any chroma noise or fuzziness. Blacks are solid and shadow detail is more than respectable. The film element used for the transfer is relatively free from blemishes, although it can be a bit grainy at times. Dual layer authoring keeps digital compression artifacts well concealed.

For this release, WAYNE’S WORLD is offered with a Dolby Digital 5.1 channel soundtrack. For the most part, this seems to be a fairly straightforward porting of the original Dolby Surround stems. Additionally, one has to remember that WAYNE’S WORLD is a comedy from the early nineties, so there isn’t much inventiveness in the sound design. Most of the stereo imaging comes from the film’s music and occasional sound effects. The surround channels add ambience and musical fill; with the occasional discrete effect dropped in to remind one that they are listening to a 5.1 mix. Dialogue is very cleanly rendered and there is a very good level of intelligibility. The film’s music sounds quite good, maintaining a high fidelity sound and no real sense of compression. English and French Dolby Surround soundtracks are also encoded onto the DVD, as are English subtitles.

Full motion video, animation and sound enhance the DVD's cleverly designed interactive menus. Through the menus, one has access to the standard scene selection and set up features, as well as a few supplemental features. Director Penelope Spheeris provides a running audio commentary that proves to be almost as entertaining as the film itself. Also included on the DVD are more than twenty minutes of new cast/crew interviews that are also pretty entertaining. A theatrical trailer closes out the DVD’s supplements.

WAYNE’S WORLD is a goofy good comedy that retains almost every bit of the charm it had when it opened in 1992. Paramount’s DVD looks and sounds just fine, making it something that fans will want to add to their comedy collections.