Director: John Francis Daley, Jonathan M. Goldstein
Distributor: Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.
Duration: 99 minutes
Vacation (Blu-ray) – Movie Review
Every family needs a vacation now and then, even if that means being in a car together with your annoying sibling and your dad singing along to way too many songs. But when you throw in a mad trucker, a handsome, though slightly off weatherman and a few of adventurous stops along the way, things can only get better. Hurray let’s go on holiday!
Rusty Griswold (Ed Helms) is a pilot for the regional airline Econo-Air, a job he does with dedication, even though he doesn’t always get the appreciation he deserves. When he comes home from work, he and his family have dinner with the Petersons, and while he learns that his wife Debbie (Christina Applegate) is tired of always going to the same place on holiday, and his youngest son seems to love bullying his older brother more than anything in the world, the Petersons seem like such a perfect family. They do family activities together, have lots of stories to tell and father and son even have their own secret handshake. Rusty realizes that his family got stuck into habits, and thus the following morning he decides to take his family on a road trip across the country, to Walley World. He rented a car, the Tartan Prancer, aka the ‘Honda of Albania’, which is a bright blue car with quite a lot of weird, unnecessary gadgets. Nonetheless, it will (hopefully) get the job done. While Rusty is very excited about his plan, his family is much less so, but in the end Debbie agrees, as she realizes he could be right when arguing that it will bring them closer together as a family.
Once they are on the road, Rusty tries to cheer things up by singing songs and talking to a trucker through the CB radio that came with the car. Unfortunately, when Kevin (Steele Stebbins), the younger son, asks him if all truckers are rapists, things soon get out of hand. Later, they also visit the place where Debbie went to college, again not such a brilliant idea when looking back. Another stop they make is at Rusty’s sister Audrey (Leslie Mann) and her husband Stone’s (Chris Hemsworth) ranch, but not before they visited the hot springs nearby. It’s getting clear that the Griswolds are in for the adventure of a lifetime, even though some of them might disagree.
After an intro that shows us Rusty on the job, flying an airplane and getting laughed at by another, international, airline pilot, we already get a glimpse of what his life must be like. When he comes home and they have dinner with the Petersons, it gets clear that they are yet another boring family who need to spice things up. When they finally get on the road, the pace starts to be quite steady, as funny events happen at regular times. It’s never too much, as in between there are always the scenes of the Griswolds driving in the Prancer, but these scenes get comical as well due to the mad truck driver, the interesting remote control of the car and Rusty’s singing.
The gags in this movie are actually quite good. Even though you can feel a lot of them coming from miles away, they are still rather funny. Of course, a drunk mother of two trying to prove a point, a pain in the neck little kid bullying his older brother and a father who, by trying to do good, gets them in some awkward situations, will always do the trick. Overall though, we laughed harder than we thought we would.
Acting performances are all as could be expected in a comedy such as this one: never very innovating, but also not bad. Steele Stebbins does a good job playing the little brother, even though there is still room for improvement.
The extras include a gag reel, deleted scenes, ‘Return to Walley World’ and ‘The Griswold Odyssey’. While the last two items mentioned might sound a tad more interesting than the regular bonus material, they turn out to be nothing more than some extra information given by both cast and crew. Interesting, though slightly disappointing due to the title.
Conclusion
Vacation is a mix between funny situations and an adventurous road trip. Even though the gags are often predictable, you’re in for a good laugh, as the film isn’t too cliché. The acting performances won’t blow you off your feet, but do the trick. All in all, this is a very enjoyable film to watch on a cozy night in.
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