Review: Vacation (2015)

Grown-up Rusty Griswold (Ed Helms), now a budget airline pilot with a wife (Christina Applegate) and kids (Skyler Gisondo and Steele Stebbins) of his own, wants to recreate his childhood family vacation to Walley World. Along the way there will be stop-offs to see sister Audrey (Leslie Mann) and her macho right-wing himbo (Chris Hemsworth), as well as parents Clark and Ellen (Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo). There will also be a lot of calamity, chaos, frustration, and puke. Yes, puke. Charlie Day plays a white-water rafting guide going through a rough patch emotionally, Ron Livingston plays an a-hole rival pilot, and Norman Reedus turns up as a surly trucker.

 

The original “Vacation” is, at least in my opinion, one of the greatest comedies ever made, so this 2015 remake (ish) from the dual writer-director team of Jonathan M. Goldstein & John Francis Daley (co-writers of the funny “Horrible Bosses” making their directorial debut) had its work cut out for it. The results are a lot better than I had anticipated, but a long way from the original, let alone the also worthy “Christmas Vacation”. It’s probably on about the same level as the unfairly maligned “European Vacation” and a touch ahead of the mild “Vegas Vacation”.

 

Playing the iconic Lindsay Buckingham song ‘Holiday Road’ early on was a good decision, as it puts an immediate smile on one’s face, and aside from a tedious stop off at the home of Audrey Griswold (Leslie Mann lazily doing ‘ditzy Leslie Mann’ schtick way past its use-by-date) and her right-wing himbo lover (played by the comedically-deficient Chris Hemsworth, perhaps meant to be the film’s Cousin Eddie), the smile never really left my face. It’s not great, but it largely works. The laughs start early as Ed Helms’ Rusty Griswold (a pilot), aided by some turbulence, ends up getting way too close to Colin Hanks’ hot wife. Meanwhile, credit where it’s due, the family car is an absolutely horrid contraption called a Prancer and comes with ugly turquoise interior and a menu system that no one can quite figure out. It ends up being the source of some of the film’s better moments, and might just be one of the most hilariously awful automobiles in cinematic history. There’s also a great ‘WTF’ moment during a college beer-drinking challenge with a totally random exchange; ‘Why is she puking so much’? ‘It’s her Asperger’s’. WHAT? I also chuckled at the moment where an attempt to have sex in four different states at once leads to public indecency and four police officers bickering with one another. Charlie Day’s intentional obnoxiousness as a nervous water rapids expert leads to his best work to date. Norman Reedus gets a great laugh by not saying a thing at one point as a creepy trucker.

 

Although the Mann-Hemsworth segment is the film’s biggest lull, I have to admit there are other negative bits. Skyler Gisondo is actually really creepy and unlikeable as the nerdy older sibling. I think we were meant to find his social awkwardness ingratiating, but Gisondo overplays it so badly that he made me feel genuinely uncomfortable. Meanwhile, Chevy Chase has lost some height, gained a lot of weight and we all know he stopped being funny after about 1992. It’s depressing to see him, actually. The cameos here by he and Beverly D’Angelo were much anticipated by me, but fall completely flat. It was great to get a cameo by one other fondly remembered element of the original “Vacation” (and no, it’s not Randy Quaid, who I believe is still hiding out in Canada and sorely missed on screen), but I must admit to being a bit miffed that there’s no Marty Moose sighting at Walley World. What the hell? Also, Keegan-Michael Key needs to stop appearing in things. Forever. Dude makes Sinbad seem like Billy Fucking Connolly. I also don’t understand showing a bunch of stills from the previous vacations blatantly giving away that completely different actors have previously played Rusty and Audrey, and none of them look alike. It was always one of the strangest things about the series, and it’s not even turned into a joke here. So that was weird.

 

Ed Helms is no Chevy Chase on the laugh-o-metre (back when Chevy was funny), nor is his profane meltdown as memorable as Chase’s, but I can absolutely see why he was cast. He’s certainly channelling the spirit of his character’s father and the actor who played him (In fact, he lays it on quite thick at times). That’s part about playing Clark’s son is something worth remembering actually. Yes, we know he’s kinda in the Chevy Chase role, but he’s actually playing Chase/Clark’s son, who is similar but not the same. He’s an easy sell in the role at the very least, as is Christina Applegate in what is essentially the Beverly D’Angelo role, or at least serving much the same function.

 

I’ll recommend this one, but it has to be said that it’s probably not going to hold up on repeated viewings, something that definitely puts it behind the original “Vacation” and “Christmas Vacation”. This sure could’ve been worse, though, and I really was expecting a giant turd. It’s actually pretty funny at times, especially that ugly Albanian minivan from hell.

 

Rating: B-