The wonderful thing about the Web is that nothing ever goes away. A dedicated fan dug up a technical paper explaining the physics of Buckaroo Banzai, written by UC Berkeley scientist Cary I. Sneider in 1984. Here's a peek...

"[L]et's take Buckaroo's invention for a spin and see how it works. First, the Overthruster produces colliding beams of electrons and positrons. These, in turn, produce copious quantities of intermediate vector bosons which are separated and focused with superconducting magnets. When focused on solid matter, the beam produces a small region of high energy density. Inside the target, spontaneous symmetry breaking imparts mass to the photons, reducing the range of the electromagnetic force to far less than a quadrillionth of a centimeter. From this small region a shock wave of broken symmetry propagates outward. Behind the shock wave matter interacts only weakly, providing for Buckaroo and his jet car to move through matter. The car must travel very fast (at least 700 miles per hour) to allow free passage before the material reverts to its normal state."— Geekazon, via Slashdot

Not familiar with the adventures of this swashbuckling particle physicist-surgeon-rock star? You can learn more at Wikipedia, IMDB, or go straight to the horse's mouth, the Banzai Institute.

"It's your hand, Buckaroo." — Dr. Hikita