Get your downvotes ready people, because I don't like this one.
With Amazon Prime now cycling on from Halloween Horror films towards Christmas, the irrational rules I set up to decide what I watch meant that reluctantly sat through "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation" - a film I might have liked when it was released, as I was nine - but now couldn't wait for the witless, tedious, pratfalls to be over.
Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase) wants to have the ultimate family Christmas, like the ones he remembers from his youth. Unfortunately, disaster befalls him at every turn as his Christmas tree is too big, his lights won't turn on and his extended family arrive to argue and snipe at him. He's also reliant on an incoming Christmas bonus from his job, which he's already spent on a Swimming pool.
I just don't like slapstick comedy that much and that's all "Christmas Vacation" is, there's no wit or jokes - there's nothing intelligent about it. It's just Chevy Chase falling over and his grandfather blowing himself up (I swear he does that the same way three times). This even extends to his neighbours (one of whom is played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus!) who must do the worst scene of 'comical' falling over that I've ever seen in my life.
It doesn't help that we now know that both the male leads of the film are terrible people in real life. Nor the scenes when Clark lusts after a shop assistant despite already having a wife that is several times out of his league. Ultimately though, I just didn't find it that funny, I say again, it's just falling over and explosions. I'm not going to suggest for a moment that all these people giving the film a good review are wrong but I just wonder if their history with it is clouding their objectivity.
With Amazon Prime now cycling on from Halloween Horror films towards Christmas, the irrational rules I set up to decide what I watch meant that reluctantly sat through "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation" - a film I might have liked when it was released, as I was nine - but now couldn't wait for the witless, tedious, pratfalls to be over.
Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase) wants to have the ultimate family Christmas, like the ones he remembers from his youth. Unfortunately, disaster befalls him at every turn as his Christmas tree is too big, his lights won't turn on and his extended family arrive to argue and snipe at him. He's also reliant on an incoming Christmas bonus from his job, which he's already spent on a Swimming pool.
I just don't like slapstick comedy that much and that's all "Christmas Vacation" is, there's no wit or jokes - there's nothing intelligent about it. It's just Chevy Chase falling over and his grandfather blowing himself up (I swear he does that the same way three times). This even extends to his neighbours (one of whom is played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus!) who must do the worst scene of 'comical' falling over that I've ever seen in my life.
It doesn't help that we now know that both the male leads of the film are terrible people in real life. Nor the scenes when Clark lusts after a shop assistant despite already having a wife that is several times out of his league. Ultimately though, I just didn't find it that funny, I say again, it's just falling over and explosions. I'm not going to suggest for a moment that all these people giving the film a good review are wrong but I just wonder if their history with it is clouding their objectivity.