Holiday Movie Category: National Lampoon’s Piece of Shit
THE CARD:
Randy Quaid’s bulbous butt, a dense wife, a befuddled Lou Grant, a smoking hot Asian, a dorky kid, a gassy canine, a dull Aussie, Griswold cans, nudge-nudge-wink-wink, and a GODDAMN monkey.
More details here.
THE ANGLE:
Clark Griswold’s white trash cousin Eddie is back. Eddie (Randy Quaid) loses his job as a guinea pig at a nuclear lab which means it’s curtains for X-mas this year. Fortunately, he gets bitten in the ass by a monkey co-worker and gets a settlement of a fabulous vacation to the South Pacific. Eddie packs up the family including recent bitter divorcee Uncle Nick (Ed Asner) and flies down to the island of Mulaka. There, he gets into a variety of pant-shittingly riotous yuck-ups: he catches a shark while fishing, he maroons himself and the family on a deserted island, he kills a boar with tweezers, he crash-lands a sea plane, and he manages to bore the living hell out of anyone watching this cheap, lying, no-good, rotten, four-flushing, low-life, snake-licking, dirt-eating, inbred, overstuffed, ignorant, blood-sucking, dog-kissing, brainless, dickless, hopeless, heartless, fat-ass, bug-eyed, stiff-legged, spotty-lipped, worm-headed sack of monkey shit. Hallelujah. Holy shit. Where's the Tylenol?
THE FINISHER:
Marty Moose eggnog mugs. That hot department store clerk. Uncle Lewis’ toupee. The electrocuted cat. Aunt Bethany’s patriotic dinner prayer. High speed sled gags. The Johnsons’ shitter. The yuppies’ comeuppance. Squirrel! Clark’s profane meltdown. And big lovable dumb smelly Cousin Eddie.
These are the things that make the original Christmas Vacation a holiday classic. Quaid’s Eddie stole the show in his three appearances in the Chevy Chase Vacation franchise, but none so memorable as his wickedly stupid turn in Christmas Vacation. So naturally, the National Lampoon folks who haven’t made a watch-able film since 1989 resurrect Eddie and his butt-dumb clan for another go-around at X-mas. Easy money, huh? Not so fast.
I was warned to approach this movie with extremely low expectations, hoping that deep down inside the clever talent of Quaid could save this hound dog, but boy was I wrong. This movie is AWFUL. I didn’t giggle once. Nobody even tried to yank a chuckle out of this lousy, lazily-written script. The visual gags (which the Eddie character is not known for pulling off) are uninspired, clumsy, and just incompetent. Lost in the crappy shuffle of this inept movie are huge talents Asner, Fred Willard, and Eric Idle who all look like they had their funny castrated. The character of Cousin Eddie works better as a second banana to Chase’s goofy Clark and can’t support a leading role, much less a hastily and sluggishly slapped together feature. Eddie was great because his belly-button-picking trailer park shtick was meant as a foil to the “normal” characters. But you are asking way too much if belly-button-picking trailer park shtick is all you got for 90 minutes. And next to this unnecessary and disappointing sequel, belly button lint is looking mighty good.
THE CARD:Randy Quaid’s bulbous butt, a dense wife, a befuddled Lou Grant, a smoking hot Asian, a dorky kid, a gassy canine, a dull Aussie, Griswold cans, nudge-nudge-wink-wink, and a GODDAMN monkey.
More details here.
THE ANGLE:
Clark Griswold’s white trash cousin Eddie is back. Eddie (Randy Quaid) loses his job as a guinea pig at a nuclear lab which means it’s curtains for X-mas this year. Fortunately, he gets bitten in the ass by a monkey co-worker and gets a settlement of a fabulous vacation to the South Pacific. Eddie packs up the family including recent bitter divorcee Uncle Nick (Ed Asner) and flies down to the island of Mulaka. There, he gets into a variety of pant-shittingly riotous yuck-ups: he catches a shark while fishing, he maroons himself and the family on a deserted island, he kills a boar with tweezers, he crash-lands a sea plane, and he manages to bore the living hell out of anyone watching this cheap, lying, no-good, rotten, four-flushing, low-life, snake-licking, dirt-eating, inbred, overstuffed, ignorant, blood-sucking, dog-kissing, brainless, dickless, hopeless, heartless, fat-ass, bug-eyed, stiff-legged, spotty-lipped, worm-headed sack of monkey shit. Hallelujah. Holy shit. Where's the Tylenol?
THE FINISHER:
Marty Moose eggnog mugs. That hot department store clerk. Uncle Lewis’ toupee. The electrocuted cat. Aunt Bethany’s patriotic dinner prayer. High speed sled gags. The Johnsons’ shitter. The yuppies’ comeuppance. Squirrel! Clark’s profane meltdown. And big lovable dumb smelly Cousin Eddie.
These are the things that make the original Christmas Vacation a holiday classic. Quaid’s Eddie stole the show in his three appearances in the Chevy Chase Vacation franchise, but none so memorable as his wickedly stupid turn in Christmas Vacation. So naturally, the National Lampoon folks who haven’t made a watch-able film since 1989 resurrect Eddie and his butt-dumb clan for another go-around at X-mas. Easy money, huh? Not so fast.
I was warned to approach this movie with extremely low expectations, hoping that deep down inside the clever talent of Quaid could save this hound dog, but boy was I wrong. This movie is AWFUL. I didn’t giggle once. Nobody even tried to yank a chuckle out of this lousy, lazily-written script. The visual gags (which the Eddie character is not known for pulling off) are uninspired, clumsy, and just incompetent. Lost in the crappy shuffle of this inept movie are huge talents Asner, Fred Willard, and Eric Idle who all look like they had their funny castrated. The character of Cousin Eddie works better as a second banana to Chase’s goofy Clark and can’t support a leading role, much less a hastily and sluggishly slapped together feature. Eddie was great because his belly-button-picking trailer park shtick was meant as a foil to the “normal” characters. But you are asking way too much if belly-button-picking trailer park shtick is all you got for 90 minutes. And next to this unnecessary and disappointing sequel, belly button lint is looking mighty good.
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