From the very start, with its elegant montage of kitschy postcards set to Lindsey Buckingham’s “Holiday Road,” “National Lampoon’s Vacation” (1983) lets the moviegoer know they’re going to get a much stronger effort than what is normally given to a road movie. Written by John Hughes and directed by Harold Ramis, one family’s cross-country quest for a theme-park vacation is an epic comedy that still makes some “best” lists two generations hence. A formula plot played out by masters, suburban dad Chevy Chase leads a cast so deep, you probably won’t realize Jane Krakowski was in it until the credits.
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Many years after “National Lampoon’s Animal House” first came out, a friend of mine re-watched it and said it seemed “slower” than he remembered it. Unlike the gag-on-gag-til-you-gag comedies of more recent generations, this film has a plot, and plot exposition, and relationshippy subplots, and there are several physical comedy scenes featuring John Belushi with almost no dialogue. And the shocking-for-1978 nudity and language is common now. That doesn’t mean it hasn’t aged well. Despite some non-PC asides, the big punchlines are still brilliant examples of comedic craftsmanship. Worthless and weak? This film changed comedy and, in some ways, college.
Billy Bob Thornton makes some weird Christmas movies. John Cusack just makes weird movies, period. These two superheroes of uncomfortable humor join forces in “The Ice Harvest” (2005) as a pair of moderately sleazy dudes who plot to steal money on Christmas Eve from an exceptionally sleazy dude (Randy Quaid). Noirishly comedic hijinks ensue, replete with double- crosses that might have been coincidences – or might have been triple-crosses. It comes off a little flat. It’s a Harold Ramis film, which probably explains why the opening credits font is the same as the one used at the end of “Animal House.”
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