It's A Long Way Down, The Holiday Road..." National Lampoon's Vacation"

National Lampoon's Vacation (1983)

Rated R for language and brief nudity

Starring Chevy Chase, Beverly D'Angelo, Anthony Michael Hall, Dana Barron

Directed by Harold Ramis

The Story:

Clark Griswold (Chase) is set to take his family from Chicago halfway across country to Wally World, the family amusement park of choice!  Instead of flying, they plan on taking a road trip across country.

What could possibly go wrong?

It's been over 30 years since we first met the Griswold family, and they live out the American Dream, turned horrific nightmare that plagues the back of the mind of every dad who prepares for a road trip with their family.

Written by John Hughes, and directed by Harold Ramis, this comedy classic has endured for generations and is only overshadowed by the ever-popular Christmas Vacation due to the seasonal nature of that one enjoying repeated holiday viewings and becoming a family tradition for most people around Christmas time.

The original though is no slouch.

Between laugh out loud jokes, gags and pratfalls, Vacation has it all.

Anchored by arguably Chevy Chase's finest performance, he plays the perfect father who sets the bar way too high, and then slowly erupts when he can no longer even get close to clearing the bar.

D'Angelo is the perfect foil who tries to keep her manic husband in check along the way.

Then of course, the memorable minor characters who litter the landscape along the road trip.  From the crazy Cousin Eddie (Randy Quaid) to the elusive Girl in the Ferrari (Christie Brinkley), the story is chock full of characterization for even the smallest of cameos.

Filled with memorable characters and quotable dialogue, this is one of those comedies that has endured.

Final Grade: A

Rewatchability/Purchase Factor: I do own it, and while it doesn't get the multiple viewings per year of the Holiday version, it averages a viewing every year or two.

R.I.P. Harold Ramis 1944-2014

The world became a much less amusing place Monday with the passing of Harold Ramis.

He was a triple threat in Hollywood: Writer. Director. Actor.

Of the 3, he was probably most famous, and will be remembered for his acting role(s), most notably as Dr. Egon Spengler from Ghostbusters.

However, it was likely his writing that won over most of us as fans in the first place.

Animal House, 1978

  "Ladies and gentlemen, I'll be brief. The issue here is not whether we broke a few rules, or took a few liberties with our female party guests - we did.

But you can't hold a whole fraternity responsible for the behavior of a few, sick twisted individuals. For if you do, then shouldn't we blame the whole fraternity system?

And if the whole fraternity system is guilty, then isn't this an indictment of our educational institutions in general?

I put it to you, Greg - isn't this an indictment of our entire American society?

Well, you can do whatever you want to us, but we're not going to sit here and listen to you badmouth the United States of America.

Gentlemen!"

Harold Ramis' first writing assignment for the big screen: Animal House.

If he had done nothing further with his writing career, that would be pretty impressive.

But Ramis wasn't done yet...

Meatballs, 1979

 "And even if we win, if we win, HAH! Even if we win! Even if we play so far above our heads that our noses bleed for a week to ten days; even if God in Heaven above comes down and points his hand at our side of the field; even if every man woman and child held hands together and prayed for us to win, it just wouldn't matter because all the really good looking girls would still go out with the guys from Mohawk because they've got all the money! It just doesn't matter if we win or we lose. IT JUST DOESN'T MATTER"

In 1979, Meatballs was released.  Again, Ramis was one of the writers, and he worked with Bill Murray and director Ivan Reitman for the first time.

This is an underrated classic in my opinion, and I watched this movie countless times on tv growing up.

However, sandwiched between Animal House and his next film, Meatballs often gets overlooked.

Caddyshack, 1980

  "License to kill gophers by the government of the United Nations. Man, free to kill gophers at will. To kill, you must know your enemy, and in this case my enemy is a varmint. And a varmint will never quit - ever. They're like the Viet Cong - Varmint Cong. So you have to fall back on superior intelligence and superior firepower. And that's all she wrote."

Once again, a film written by Harold Ramis, but also for the first time, he sits behind the director's chair.

How did he do?

It's in the hole!

This is the undeniable sports classic when it comes to golf, Caddyshack will live forever.

It was 1981 when I became aware of Harold Ramis, the actor...

Stripes, 1981

 "Army Training, Sir!"

10 years old, and I went to the movies with my parents and we saw Stripes.

Yes, I have awesome parents.

While much of the movie may have soared over my head at the time, the premise of the story was straightforward enough, and the acting and writing were, and still are, hilarious.

This was the 2nd time that Ramis, Murray and Reitman worked together.

Even more successful than their first outing, but nothing would prepare them for what came next when they all worked together.

However, it was time for Ramis to direct his 2nd feature film before that happened...

National Lampoon's Vacation, 1983

No Bill Murray this time, but he did call upon a Caddyshack alumni to lead as Clark Griswold.  This movie still holds up well after all these years, and is only overshadowed by Christmas Vacation thanks to the annual replayability during the holidays.


Then, the phenomenon happened, and thanks to the title song, lives to this day thanks to 80s radio airplay...

Ghostbusters, 1984

"We're ready to believe you!"

Once again, Ramis writes for Murray and directed by Reitman.

Easily the biggest hit of their careers, and a movie that is still great, 30 years later.

Sadly, the much rumored Part 3 won't happen now.

Fast forward to 1993, and Ramis and Murray teamed together one last time, and created a masterpiece...

Groundhog Day, 1993

"This is pitiful. A thousand people freezing their butts off waiting to worship a rat. What a hype. Groundhog Day used to mean something in this town. They used to pull the hog out, and they used to eat it. You're hypocrites, all of you!"

Written and directed by Ramis, and starring Bill Murray, this was their last collaboration together.

The movie is cinematic genius, partly due to Murray's delivery, but Ramis' direction is effortless and his writing is as crisp and sharp as it ever was.

I will cap off Ramis' career with one last film (even though it had a sequel...)

Analyze This, 1999

"I wasn't really gonna whack you."

"Paul..."

"Okay, I was gonna whack you. But I was real conflicted about it."

Harold Ramis wrote and directed Analyze This starring Billy Crystal and Robert DeNiro.

It's brave enough to write a comedy and have it star Billy Crystal, who is already hilarious.

But they took DeNiro and gave him a sense of humor.

And it worked!


The low points to Harold Ramis' career are really inconsequential.

He left us with a legacy of work that, at least for me, makes him one of unquestioned great cinematic comic minds of the late 20th Century.

I will miss his further contributions to film.

I will cherish those memories he gave us.


R.I.P.

Was it Over When the Germans Bombed Pearl Harbor? "National Lampoon's Animal House"

Toga! Toga! Toga!

The Story:

The Fraternity that everyone wanted to be a part of, Delta House.  The students, and I use that term loosely, are bent on having a good time.  As they initiate their newest pledges, Larry (Tom Hulce) and Kent (Stephen Furst) the Deltas, led by Boone, Eric and Bluto  (Peter Riegert, Tim Matheson and John Belushi) are going to show them everything not to do in college, in comparison to the uptight fraternity nearby, including the likes of Neidermeyer (Mark Metcalf) and Greg (James Daughton).  Little do the Deltas know they are on double-secret probation from Dean Wormer (John Vernon) and he is out to expel the whole lot of them.

The results ensure that people will attend college for generations, just in the hopes that any part of this movie is real.

: )

So where do you begin?  Harold Ramis' first movie that he wrote.  Check.

John Belushi's first big screen role? Check.

John Landis' first big-budget feature film? Check.

First or early appearances for most of the cast? Check.

The name National Lampoon actually meant something? Check.

Welcome to lightning in a bottle.  It doesn't happen with every movie, but when it does, it's often magical.

Don't believe me?

Consider that this movie is now...drumroll.... 35 years old.

And it's still as awesome as when it first came out.

Perhaps it's that perfect synergy of all those new people working  and not knowing what they could and couldn't do, so they threw it all out there and hoped it would find an audience.

It did.

And it continues to find a new audience with every passing generation.

It's crude. It's crass.

It's a classic.

Final Grade: A

Rewatchability/Purchase Factor: I do own a copy, and it doesn't see much replay in the house because much of it is not intended for the demographic in my household. ; )  I'll probably have to show it to the older kids someday to warn them how NOT to do college.  : )

100 Greatest Movies of All Time... That I Own. # 31 ~ Groundhog Day

Oh, that Harold Ramis does it again!

Does it seem like I've written something like that before?

Well perfect, because that makes even more sense when you consider today's movie, Groundhog Day.

Harold Ramis  co-wrote it, and he directed it.

This will be Ramis' last visit on the countdown, but I would like to give a shout-out to Analyze This, a movie that could have, and possibly should have made the countdown.  Also, National Lampoon's Vacation, which originally made the countdown, and then was a last minute scratch when I decided that no franchise could hit the countdown more than once.  Silly rules...

Trust me, every day that I post a new review, I find at least 4 or 5 movies that should have knocked Star Wars off this list.

I am not proud of that fact...

:  /

As usual for many of the movies that Ramis wrote or directed, Bill Murray stars in it.

This also happens to be one of Bill Murray's best movies.

If you've never seen it, here's a quick synopsis:

Phil is a callous weatherman sent to cover the Groundhog Day celebration in Punxsutawney PA.  They get snowed in, and have to spend the night there.

When Phil wakes up the next morning... it's Groundhog Day.

Again.

Everything happens exactly as it did the day before...and Phil is the only one that notices.

Can Phil break the Deja Vu that he constantly relives every day?  Or is he doomed to spend his entire existence celebrating a quirky non-holiday?

Along for the ride is his producer, Andie MacDowell.  Eventually Phil will pull out all the stops to try and win her love, at least for the night, because no matter what he does, at the end of the day, the giant reset button starts him all over again.

If you haven't seen it, it is available for streaming from Netflix as of this writing.

100 Greatest Movies of All Time...That I Own. # 38 ~ Caddyshack

We've had football.

We've had more than our share of baseball.

But golf?

Is that even a sport?

And should there be movies about it???

Amazingly, the two best golf movies I've ever seen almost both made the countdown.

Tin Cup would easily land in the Top 150.

But I could not deny the humor and zaniness of Caddyshack.

I told you Harold Ramis would be back.

In this, his directorial debut, he could have hung it up, because it doesn't get much better than this.  Thankfully he didn't, but he could have.

For those that have never seen the film...

As the catchphrase goes: It's the slobs versus the snobs.

You have a wonderful uppity country club and all of their members plus their caddies.   Then one day, a member with the requirements, but not the class... shows up and turns the country club upside down.

The film stars a who's-who of comedic actors of the late 70s/early 80s.  Most will agree that Bill Murray steals the film as the groundskeeper, and he does.

However the main thrust of Rodney Dangerfield as the outsider trying to fit in, against Ted Knight's uptight judge carries the main momentum of the film.

As I've said before, the better you want your hero to be, you better have an equally entertaining villain.

Ted Knight brings bluster and fire to his performance, literally playing the straight man to the zanies, and it works perfectly.  Look at the picture for this film.  He is literally losing his cool on camera, and it's hilarious.  He is the perfect foil for Dangerfield (and Chase) in the film, and was a casting stroke of genius.

Strangely, the slowest drag in the film comes when they put Murray and Chase in the same scene together.  What should have been comic gold kind of grinds to a halt, and is only mildly amusing.  Otherwise, the movie is hilarious, and will likely be quoted for all time on golf courses around the world...

"It's in the hole!"

100 Greatest Movies of All Time...That I Own. # 65 ~ Ghostbusters

Who you gonna call?

Ghostbusters!

The all Ivan Reitman weekend concludes with arguably his best movie, Ghostbusters.

Once again, Harold Ramis is behind the scenes as one of the writers on this project, and he teams onscreen with Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd as the unlikely trio of paranormal investigators, Dr. Venkman, Stantz and Spengler.

Of course, it's hard to be taken seriously as ghost hunters if there are no ghosts, but luckily for these guys, New York is suddenly swimming in them.

Cue the addition of Sigourney Weaver and Rick Moranis to lend their talents to the movie.  Suddenly, it's not just some random ghosts that the boys are trying to catch, but they need to stop a full-fledged invasion from beyond!

Will they succeed?  Probably...since there was a Ghostbusters II...

However, better than that was the cartoon.  It was pretty awesome. : )

This movie is just plain fun from start to finish.  It's a great one to break the kids on to start showing them "scary movies".  They call them "baby steps" for a reason.  Gotta start small!

I have to admit, I am curious to see what they will end up doing with the rumored 3rd installment of the franchise.  The Next Generation?  Hmmm.  If they get the right cast, it can probably work.  But going off the original, you've got to have a great story and quality cast, otherwise...

Meh.

100 Greatest Movies of All Time...That I Own. # 72 ~ Stripes

If memory serves correctly, this was the first "R" rated movie I ever saw.  And no, I didn't sneak in, or catch it on cable.  Honest to goodness attended at a theatre with my parents in tow.  Not sure why we went, but I do remember seeing this one on the big screen.

It was awesome.

Pretty darn funny movie, for a 10 year old.  It got funnier as I got older and could appreciate more of the jokes.

It also helped cement my love for Bill Murray, and possibly began the string of seeing the Saturday Night Live performers up on the silver screen.

This was either the first, or second Ivan Reitman film I saw.  Great director who has been on the countdown already, and isn't finished just yet.  If this wasn't the first, then that honor belongs to Meatballs.  Murray and Reitman normally equals cinematic gold.

For those that haven't seen it, it's the story of a schlub who decides to join the Army.  He takes his best friend with him, and naturally gets put in basic training with a squad of all rejects.  Amazing how that happens.  The movie unfolds in two parts, the basic training, and then the top secret mission that these bumbling simpletons get picked for!

Among the supporting cast on this film are the always amazing John Candy as Ox, and Harold Ramis as Murray's best friend.  Ramis probably deserves more than his fair share of credit to how good this movie is, as he had a hand in drafting the screenplay.  Considering the other movies that he has worked on as a writer or director, the man has more hits than misses, and more credits than people probably realize.

Of course the movie undeniably belongs to Bill Murray.  With the lead in Meatballs behind him, and a memorable part in Caddyshack, this appears to be the movie that cemented the fact that Murray could headline a movie as the star.

His biggest hit would come when he reteamed with Reitman and Ramis, but that is a tale for another day on the countdown.

That's the fact, Jack!