NATIONAL LAMPOON'S CHRISTMAS VACATION. Directed by Jeremiah S. Chechik; written by John Hughes; produced by John Hughes and Tom Jacobson. Starring Chevy Chase, Beverly D'Angelo and Randy Quaid. Rated PG-13.
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It's too bad in a way.
There are precious few movies so well suited to the comic tastes of nine-year-old boys as Christmas Vacation.
But, unfortunately, it is too gross and too corny to be entertaining for adults (or even older kids). And it's too vulgar to be really appropriate for its apparent target audience of nine-year-olds.
The same family is involved here as in the other Vacation movies: good-hearted but disaster-prone Clark Griswold (Chase), long-suffering wife Ellen (D'Angelo) and children (played this time by Johnny Galecki and Juliette Lewis). And the same sorts of broad, slapstick misadventures befall them from opening to closing credits.
The only difference is that they aren't on the road (except to get their Christmas tree). They decide to spend Christmas at home with "kith and kin," instead of taking one of their family trips.
The movie isn't completely without redeeming features. I enjoyed the whole sequence involving putting up the Christmas lights, perhaps since the same ritual was just acted out at our house.
And the (too) infrequent glimpses into the hapless life of the Griswolds' neighbors are delightful satire. Contrasted with Clark's feverish family feeling, the Chesters (Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Nicholas Guest) are tres chic yuppies who don't have a Christmas tree just because it's such a cliche.
But there's just too much silliness here, too many of Chase's patented mugging shots, and too many cheap laughs for anyone but the nine-year-olds in the audience.
December 20, 1989