Director: Jeremiah Chechik
Writer: John Hughes (Screenplay)
Starring: Chevy Chase, Beverly D’Angelo, Juliette Lewis, Johnny Galecki, John Randolph, Diane Ladd
Plot: The Griswold family’s plans for a big family Christmas predictably turn into a big disaster.
Tagline – Yule crack up!
Runtime: 1 Hour 37 Minutes
There may be spoilers in the rest of the review
Verdict: True American Christmas Film
Story: National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation starts when Clark Griswold (Chase) has decided his family, Ellen (D’Angelo), Audrey (Lewis) and Rusty (Galecki) are going to host Christmas for the whole family this year, as per normal for Clark he goes through a series of mishaps as the family reacts to his action.
Clark will soon learn that hosting Christmas isn’t going to be as easy as he once thought as the series of unfortunate events seem to be piling up.
Thoughts on National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation
Characters – Clark is the ever-enthusiastic father, husband and son that wants to impress his family with his first Christmas as a complete family, this soon leads him to make a series of clumsy errors which only he could find himself in. Ellen is the ever-supportive wife of Clark that isn’t sure this will be a good idea, though she supports this decision through. Audrey and Rusty are the children that are seeing their father and his series of events, while we do get to see many of the family members through the year.
Performances – Chevy Chase was always the heart of the vacation movies, his performance shows a comic timing are perfect through the film, while the rest of the cast know how to let him get the most out of his moments.
Story – The story follows the events of the Griswold’s as they look to celebrate their first Christmas in Clark’s household. This continues the idea of seeing the holidays that the family go on and how they go wrong, while teaching the lesson about supporting your family no matter how different they are, because family is what is important at the holiday time. This doesn’t do anything to that we don’t already know and we have seen many movies try to do this since and failed. This is the one that the Christmas time will call for seeing once a year, at Christmas.
Comedy – The comedy here shows us just how brilliant at timing Chevy Chase is, because nearly every laugh comes from him, we do also get the set-up laugh moments which pay off well through the film too.
Settings – The film is set in the Gridwold household which shows us how everyone can come together for Christmas.
Scene of the Movie – Squirrel chase.
That Moment That Annoyed Me – The neighbours is almost pointless.
Final Thoughts – This is a brilliant America Christmas movie that can be enjoyed by the whole family for years to come.
Overall: True Christmas classic.
Rating
