National Lampoon’s Vacation is a 1983 comedy film written by John Hughes and directed by Harold Ramis and starring Chevy Chase as Clark Griswold as he goes on a family road trip from Chicago to California to visit Walley World, America’s Favorite Family Fun Park.
Over the course of the film the Griswold family visits many U.S. states such as Kansas and Arizona with many jokes and gags along the way such as Clark using the computer to map out the trip, but his kids then try and eat the car as Pac-Man.
Along the way they visit Ellen’s(Clark’s wife) cousin Cartherine and her husband Eddie who send them off with aunt Edna and her dog both of whom die on the trip with the dog getting accidentally dragged along the road which causes Clark to get pulled over by a cop.
The film ends with the Griswold family arriving at Walley World to find that it’s closed for repairs, seeing that Clark holds a security guard hostage(played by John Candy) to go on the rides.
After going on many rides a LAPD SWAT team, along with Roy Walley, the parks owner, show up and arrest Clark but after a talk with Mr. Walley, he decides not to press charges and the film ends with Mr. Walley, the Griswolds, Walley World security guards, and the LAPD SWAT team riding down a roller coaster.
I think that National Lampoon’s Vacation is one of the best 80s comedies I’ve seen and is a true classic. I especially liked the “Somewhere in Arizona” text that appears when the family got lost in, of course, Arizona.
I would recommend Vacation to any fan comedy and/or 80s movies as it is a hilariously great film with a great director, writer, and cast of actors, and even some of the sequels are good and popular too, namely Christmas Vacation.
