National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989)

Crappy film

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

I hated this film. It's disturbing and hard to watch, not funny. It's a torture film. Most of the characters are extremely unlikable, but I felt that the main character is too sympathetic for the movie to work in the least bit. I felt so bad for Clark because of how much he goes through and how much crap he takes from people. The best scene by far was when he stood up to the obnoxious characters, because I sat through the entire film waiting for that to happen. The cinematography, color, and music (by David Lynch's composer, Angelo Badalamenti) were all good. It is not an absolute waste, but it's a frustrating experience. Certainly not worth a watch. I fail to understand the popularity.

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation is the third instalment into the Vacation series. Chevy Chase and Beverly D'Angelo return to reprise their roles of Clark and Ellen Griswold. As-well the children have been recast again, this time Juliette Lewis and Jonny Galecki star as Audrey and rusty. And they're the most memorable of the young actors in these roles.Christmas Vacation sees the Griswold's host Christmas with their dysfunctional extended family that have a knack of causing all sorts of mischief and chaos. Whilst Clark and Ellen act as the glue that holds both families together. This film is definitely a vast improvement over European Vacation. The story and over-all zaniness has been toned down making the film more palatable.One of the biggest issues I had with the film is it recycles many of the jokes that were done in the first two films. There were some jokes that made think seriously they're doing this again, in-particular Clark's dream sequence. A-lot of the jokes didn't hit the mark for me. However all the performances felt earnest and all the characters were likeable especially Chevy Chase and Beverly D'Angelo who were once again the best thing about the film.Over-all Christmas Vacation is a safe film that tones down some of the more raunchier humour of the previous films. However due to the sheer likeability of the Griswolds, Christmas Vacation makes for a charming if at times slightly dull Christmas film.

At this stage in the Vacation series, you'd expect a drop in the overall quality, maybe the laughs have dried up and the series is being milked too much..., oh but no, absolutely and very much no, Christmas Vacation is probably the funniest in the series, despite being the third film in the series. It's old school laughs, stuff you probably wouldn't get away with in this overly-saturated politically correct society of today, and that alone has made the film grow even better with age, as society gets worse, the film gets better.The quintessential Christmas film, for me personally Christmas just wouldn't be the same if we didn't break out the old DVD and watch it at least once, on a personal level this actually is my favourite Christmas film, the reason being because of how realistic it is, compared to other Christmas films that rely on magic, Santa Claus and fictional fairy tales to drive the story, Christmas Vacation doesn't, it instead promotes the truth......The pure and simple truth, in a comical way.It shows that Christmas is stressful, it isn't all that great, it shows that the basis of Christmas is built on money, not on magic, that things go wrong e.g. the Christmas lights that blanket the outside of the house, they won't initially work so Clark Griswold throws a tantrum, that's Christmas, that's proper Christmas.Even for unrelated people things can go wrong e.g. the neighbours, the young fashionable couple that Clark torments something chronic with all the mishaps and accidents, e.g. the icicle that smashes straight through their window without warning.We all have family that comes out of the woodwork every Christmas, and despite being somewhat exaggerated in Christmas Vacation, it still hits the nail on the head and gets the point across..., these people will descend on you and you need the patience of a saint to get through it unscathed, but just as in this film, that very rarely happens, there's always an argument, a fuss, a disagreement, a falling out of some description. And alas somewhere out there, we all have a Cousin Eddie..., an embarrassment of a family that everyone's ashamed of, but still they come, unable to see their own flaws. It's realistic, it's a send up, it's satire at its most grotesque, and this is Christmas whether you like it or not.On another note, true to form, as with every Vacation film, there's a new actor playing the son, Rusty Griswold..., the lad portraying Rusty here is none other than Johnny Galecki, most famous for playing Leonard in the hit TV series "The Big Bang Theory"

A fun, Christmas-themed comedy movie featuring Chevy Chase and Beverly D'Angelo. I liked this more than NATIONAL LAMPOON'S European VACATION, although I still haven't seen the original VACATION as yet. This film plays out as you'd expect, featuring Chase juggling the demands of his visiting family members with putting on the whole Christmas razzle-dazzle.The first half of this film is particularly strong when it focuses on decent slapstick moments: the whole situation with the Christmas lights, the stuff in the attic, and the bit with the staple gun, which is my favourite moment. By the time all of the old-timers show up, it does start to get bogged down a bit, although the film is enlivened by the presence of Randy Quaid's enjoyably scuzzy cousin and there are some hilarious scenes like the turkey carving.Occasionally, and especially towards the end, Christmas VACATION descends into schmaltz, but then that's down to John Hughes who can never resist inserting some sentimentality into his work (it's even there in my favourite of his films, PLANES, TRAINS & AUTOMOBILES, although John Candy is so sympathetic that it works). Chase and D'Angelo are on top form here and the film as a a whole is difficult to dislike as it has so much energy and so many constant gags. Watch out for a fresh-faced Juliette Lewis in one of her earlier performances.