National Lampoon's Christmas VacationChristmas comes but once a year--and that's a good thing for Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase), because he probably couldn't survive another go around. National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation follows the zany zealotry of Clark in his pursuit of a perfect Christmas with his family, from ill-fated attempts to claim the perfect Christmas tree from out in the wilderness to a desperate attempt to ensure his twenty-five thousand light ornamentation of the Griswold home glows bright enough to cause a power outage. With such quixotic aspirations, what could possibly go wrong?
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National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation is the third entry in the Vacation series of films, with common threads including Clark's mania to connect with his family and his wife, Ellen (Beverly D'Angelo), who operates as the more level-headed counterpart to her husband's ever thinning nerves. One notable difference from its predecessors is that Christmas Vacation is, in fact, a "stay-cation" for the Griswolds, and Clark and Ellen's respective parents join them and their kids, Audrey (Juliette Lewis) and Rusty (Johnny Galecki), to occupy the Griswold homestead like sardines in a tin, where the cabin fever and claustrophobia stokes the flames of Clark's edginess, compounded with the surprise visit by his simple cousin, Eddie (Randy Quaid). Like the earlier films in the series, Christmas Vacation was written by John Hughes, adapted from one of his contributions to National Lampoon magazine, based on his childhood vacation experiences. Although not the director of Christmas Vacation--that's Jeremiah S. Chechik--John Hughes style can be felt all over the film, as the seemingly stable suburban life of Clark Griswold unravels over the course of a scant two weeks. In all fairness, Clark's not exclusively to blame; it's really when he discovers what his callous boss, Frank Shirley (Brian Doyle-Murray), considers an adequate Christmas bonus that Clark becomes truly unhinged. Clark's dream is to put in a swimming pool, and his big gamble was to put a deposit down on it, an investment in his dreams...or fantasies at least. It's not even that Clark is pining for acknowledgement or appreciation as much as he wants to create a scenario in his life which is as perfect as it seems in the movies, even his nostalgic memories of Christmases long past, which he watches wearing a women's fur coat to keep warm while trapped in the attic. Clark wants what's coming to him, why he's been busting his butt at his company for seventeen years developing non-nutritive coatings for food products. He wants a taste of that fantastic life he reads about in his sap-coated People magazine, even if he has to concede that the sexy shopgirl must remain exclusively a part of his luau dreams.
As extreme as Clark's tribulations are, they are relatable to anyone whose felt overwhelmed with the pressures and predictable unpredictability of accidents and misfires that seem to plague the holidays, and all the traditional terrors and anxieties which accompany it. The film is told over a series of days, coyly introduced using a festive display which, as charming as it is, makes one feel like it is an inevitable countdown to doomsday. Christmas Vacation is largely presented as a series of identifiable Christmas mishaps, events like the episode to get the tree at the start of the film, a preamble establishing the movie's narrative structure. These episodes feel like a laundry list of moments that are oddly comforting for viewers in their comedic absurdity because they are identifiable, because I'm sure a lot of people have had some kind of mishap while sledding down a hill--albeit maybe not while lubricating the sled with industrial strength kitchen grease. Although Clark puts up with a lot over the course of Christmas Vacation, he's not presented merely as a guy who gets ground down by the promise of suburban nirvana; actually, Clark gets quite a few lines and zingers in when provoked, letting out what he really thinks of his snide, yuppie neighbors when they accost him over his tree, or to the trail of yes men following his boss to a meeting. Most of Clark's inner voice of umbrage comes out after he's undergone some stressful event, and you can almost hear it snap like a pencil inside him, his annoyance creeping out, saying the things we'd likely be thinking in his shoes. So when his prized Christmas tree--which was heralded to him by a star above out in an unsullied forest of evergreens--is engulfed in flames courtesy of a combination of factors by his unappreciative extended family, sure, Clark goes a little nutty, and tries to set it right in as straightforward, if insane, of a way as he can given the timing. And if that event happens to lead to a stray squirrel running rampant through the house, chased by a rottweiler with a sinus condition, destroying everything in sight, well, I guess the dominoes just keep tumbling over onto Clark. They're extreme examples and a condensation of the kinds of madness which can come with putting on a performance for family, but part of the awkward chuckling and humor comes from the likelihood that someone, somewhere in the audience, has probably had something a bit like this happen to them, making it easier to sympathize with poor old Clark.
Recommended for: Fans of an outrageous Christmas comedy with loads of moments which anyone whose tried too hard around the holidays can relate to. And don't be surprised if you get the urge to look up how to gift someone a year-long subscription to a Jelly of the Month club after watching. After all, it's the gift that keeps on giving.
As extreme as Clark's tribulations are, they are relatable to anyone whose felt overwhelmed with the pressures and predictable unpredictability of accidents and misfires that seem to plague the holidays, and all the traditional terrors and anxieties which accompany it. The film is told over a series of days, coyly introduced using a festive display which, as charming as it is, makes one feel like it is an inevitable countdown to doomsday. Christmas Vacation is largely presented as a series of identifiable Christmas mishaps, events like the episode to get the tree at the start of the film, a preamble establishing the movie's narrative structure. These episodes feel like a laundry list of moments that are oddly comforting for viewers in their comedic absurdity because they are identifiable, because I'm sure a lot of people have had some kind of mishap while sledding down a hill--albeit maybe not while lubricating the sled with industrial strength kitchen grease. Although Clark puts up with a lot over the course of Christmas Vacation, he's not presented merely as a guy who gets ground down by the promise of suburban nirvana; actually, Clark gets quite a few lines and zingers in when provoked, letting out what he really thinks of his snide, yuppie neighbors when they accost him over his tree, or to the trail of yes men following his boss to a meeting. Most of Clark's inner voice of umbrage comes out after he's undergone some stressful event, and you can almost hear it snap like a pencil inside him, his annoyance creeping out, saying the things we'd likely be thinking in his shoes. So when his prized Christmas tree--which was heralded to him by a star above out in an unsullied forest of evergreens--is engulfed in flames courtesy of a combination of factors by his unappreciative extended family, sure, Clark goes a little nutty, and tries to set it right in as straightforward, if insane, of a way as he can given the timing. And if that event happens to lead to a stray squirrel running rampant through the house, chased by a rottweiler with a sinus condition, destroying everything in sight, well, I guess the dominoes just keep tumbling over onto Clark. They're extreme examples and a condensation of the kinds of madness which can come with putting on a performance for family, but part of the awkward chuckling and humor comes from the likelihood that someone, somewhere in the audience, has probably had something a bit like this happen to them, making it easier to sympathize with poor old Clark.
Recommended for: Fans of an outrageous Christmas comedy with loads of moments which anyone whose tried too hard around the holidays can relate to. And don't be surprised if you get the urge to look up how to gift someone a year-long subscription to a Jelly of the Month club after watching. After all, it's the gift that keeps on giving.