National Lampoon's European Vacation

No, National Lampoon's European Vacation isn't as strong as the original Vacation movie, but it still captures some classic Griswold (Griswald?) moments. The jokes aren't as clever during this family outing, and the humor starts to feel repetitive by the end. Nevertheless, I don't mind taking this trip with Clark, Ellen, Rusty & Audrey every now and then.

I have seen this movie many times and although it is nearly 20 years old, it still makes me laugh.Europe as experienced by an American family is very funny and even people who are offended by the so-called lack of respect towards the old continent, should agree that the typical characteristics of the English, French, Germans and Austrians are true to life, although admittedly slightly exaggerated.It's an unpretentious movie which aims at offering a better form of slapstick. Chevy Chase with his mixture of good intentions and bewilderment is always hilarious. One good piece of advice: NEVER go to Austria and watch the guys doing those typical male dances in their short leather pants.After having seen this movie, you will be subjected to hysterical laughter!

`Pig in a Poke' is the newest game show in the US. Families dress up in pig costumes and answer questions. At the end, they can be pigs and win a great prize. And who's starring on it? Why, none other than our favorite family the Griswalds (spelled differently in this one than the others)! After a close competition with resident champions the Froegers, they win a European vacation. Audrey (Dana Hill) doesn't want to leave behind her boyfriend Jack (William Zabka), and Rusty (Jason Lively) just doesn't want to go. They do, reluctantly, but this two week vacation doesn't go without a hitch.

2nd released in the series, and usually considered least of the series, which I go with. Simply, it's not as funny as the others: Vacation, Christmas Vacation, and Vegas Vacation. It tries to be more raucous and irreverent than the others. It doesn't have a central grasp on any one plot. They go across Europe, but there's nothing that connects all of the destinations. For instance, in Vacation there was Aunt Edna; Christmas Vacation, it actually had a real plot, and in Vegas Vacation there were a few subplots, but they all went through.

All that isn't to say that it wasn't funny, it's just not as funny as the other three. As heard from Chevy Chase on the subpar DVD commentary, he wishes to do another Vacation movie. I would like to see that. Many of the laughs came from slapstick and pratfalls, which aren't my favorite types of humor. Some of them were predictable (they go to Stonehenge…guess what?), but some of the gags (like on the train to Rome) were nice.

The MPAA wrongly gave this movie its PG-13 rating. It most definitely should have been rated R. The writers, which include veteran John Hughes, must have tried to keep the humor in the PG-13 range, because they didn't `rough it up' as much as they wanted to.

One last thought: if there was an earlier movie version of Chicago, Beverly D'Angelo would have been perfect as Roxie.

My rating: 6/10

Rated PG-13 for sustained scenes of nudity, sexual situations, teen drinking and language.

We once again follow the Griswold family consisting of the overly ambitious Clark (Chevy Chase), more down to Earth Ellen (Beverly D'Angelo) and their teenage children son Rusty (Jason Lively) who's mind is primarily on partying and girls, and Audrey (Dana Hill) whose focus is mainly on her boyfriend Jack (William Zabka) while she deals with insecurities regarding her weight and appearance. After winning an all expenses paid European vacation on game show, Pig in a Poke, the Griswolds are once again off on a vacation as shenanigans ensue.

Following the success of the first National Lampoon's Vacation, Warner Bros. Approached John Hughes for a sequel which Hughes turned down, though he would later return to the series adapting his short story Christmas '59 into National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. With Harold Ramis and John Hughes not returning for what at the time was known as Vacation II, the studio hired Amy Heckerling of Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Johnny Dangerously to direct and Robert Klane who at that point was best known for Carl Riner's 1970 film Where's Poppa? And a number of comedies that flopped. When the movie was released it had a bigger opening weekend than its predecessor, but didn't have staying power at the box office making $12 million less than the first film at the box office while still turning a respectable profit. Critical reception was more negative this time around and audiences, while slightly more forgiving, were more split on the film. There are some good moments in European Vacation, but there's also some missteps that keep it from being in company with the first film.

Unlike the first film where the episodic story had an engine driving us forward with the arrival to Wally World, European Vacation doesn't have that engine to it. Because the Griswold's have most of their expenses taken care of for them by the gameshow package and they just leisurely go around European locations before transitioning to the next one, it puts a damper on the comic energy because we don't have anything to really build upon. With the road to Wally World in the first one there was a sense of building tension and dwindling resources as the status of the "Family Truckster" deteriorated more and more over time and tensions built among the Griswolds that set the stage for payoffs and escalation to complement the episodic nature of the story and we really don't have that here. The closest we get to something like that is Dana Hill's Audrey pining over her boyfriend Jack played by William Zabka and the take on Audrey is absolutely obnoxious because she only ever does two things 1) complain about the fattiness of the food and 2) whine about how much she misses Jack. Dana Hill is a fine actress if given the right material but she becomes a grating presence when her character's defining features are missing her boyfriend who's positioned as being rather verbally abusive and uncaring which is never really addressed in the movie. Eventually we do get some of that energy in the last third where the Griswolds are in Rome and they become entangled with a thief played by Victor Lanoux and it's probably the closest we get to the level we saw in the first film. There are still some very funny sequences in the movie particularly in Germany where we see Clark involved in Bavarian folk dancing that escalates into a full scale riot and Chevy Chase's line readings can still get a laugh such as when they're stuck in a roundabout in London, but without that engine driving the sequences forward they don't gain the same momentum.

European Vacation isn't a complete failure as there's still some very solid comedic setpieces and performances and there is novelty mined from the European setting. Unfortunately Robert Klane just doesn't understand these characters like Hughes did and they feel less grounded than they were in the first film and more like chaos engines for the various European cities and they lose a bit of their relatability with this fantasy of an all expenses paid European vacation pretty far removed from a cross country road trip to a Disneyland analog. Worth a viewing if you like these characters, but it's not to the level of the first film.

What happens when a moron takes a road trip around Europe.

Starring Chevy Chase, Beverly D'Angelo, Dana Hill and Jason Lively.

Written by John Hughes and Robert Klane,

Directed by Amy Heckerling.

I chose this oldie to watch on New Year's Eve with my family.

It's a fun movie and kept us entertained while we waited for Big Ben to chime in the new year. We all had a good chuckle and I think we all enjoyed it. I don't know what was funnier, the script or the eighties clothes!

A fun way to see in the New Year,

7/10