Vacation revisits the somewhat beloved comedy classic of the same name. Here we find Rusty Griswold (Ed Helms) all grown up with a family of his own, working as a pilot for a budget airline. He and his wife Debbie (Christina Applegate) seem to have fallen into a rut, and their kids James and Kevin (Skyler Gisondo and Steele Stebbins) just don’t get along. After hearing Debbie complain about the cabin they usually visit for Memorial day, Rusty, just like his dad over thirty years ago, decides to pack his family into a car for a two thousand mile road trip to California theme park Walley World.
This is technically a sequel, but it’s really more of a remake. The film begins with the same opening credits sequence of goofy family vacation photos set to the Lyndsey Buckingham’s Holiday Road. They hit plenty of the same beats, with just minor tweaks in context. The relatives they visit in the middle of the movie, for example, are rich instead of poor. What ultimately gives this film somewhat of an original voice is its willingness to be more vulgar. It is also what makes this film such a disappointment. It loses the warmth of the original movie, trading it in for a mean-spiritedness that leaves a foul taste in the mouth.
There is actually a lot that could have been done with the original Vacation framework. It is fondly remembered, but mostly for individual gags. It’s very loosely put together, and a modern update could have tried to make the pieces fit together better. But this film is just as loose and episodic, and it doesn’t really seem interested in exploring the narrative elements that it already introduces. A subplot concerning Rusty’s sister Audrey (Leslie Mann) and her politically conservative husband Stone (Chris Hemsworth) feels like fertile ground for narrative and thematic exploration, but the film squanders the opportunity and throws the whole thread away in a line near the end of the movie.
And so the film lives and dies on its gags, and in this regard your mileage might vary. The film seems much more intent to shock than to generate laughs. Modern sensibilities have driven the R-rated comedy to new, vulgar heights. An early scene in a sorority house results in an abundance of vomit. The trailers have already revealed an extended gag involving the Griswolds bathing in raw sewage, rubbing feces all over themselves. The film gets some good laughs out of a sustained running gag involving the temperament of the Albanian rental car they’re using to get across the country, but for the most part the film is a parade of humiliations that more often than not involve bodily functions.
Ed Helms plays Rusty with dedication, if not exactly imbuing him with likability. He produces a more defined character than Chevy Chase did for Clark Griswold, but it still leans heavily into the buffoonery of a different era. Christina Applegate finds a measure of depth in her portrayal of Debbie, but too often the film steers her away from development to land her in the next humiliation. Skyler Gisondo and Steele Stebbins are charming enough as the kids, but their antics grow tiresome. A parade of comedy veterans pop up in the movie, lending plenty of talent to material that isn’t quite worth it.
One’s enjoyment of Vacation is entirely dependent on one’s tolerance for a certain kind of humor. If you think a little kid constantly cursing while abusing his big brother is hilarious, this might work for you. If you enjoy humor that involves bodily functions, this movie has that in spades. But if you’re looking for any sort of story, or anything tying all these random humiliations together, then you’re out of luck. Vacation is just a more vulgar, less warm version of the original. And that’s not really an improvement.
My Rating:
