Family road trips can bring out the worst in us.
Five people crowded into a tiny car for several days can easily cause problems. And that’s especially for the Griswold family.
But despite the chaos that ensues, Clark Griswold means well. He wants to use his two weeks of vacation to drive his wife (Ellen) and children (Audrey and Rusty) cross country to the amusement park Walley World.
Although Ellen and the kids would prefer to fly, Clark believes a road trip is the ideal way to travel. “Getting there is part of the fun,” he says. So the Griswolds pack their things into their ugly new station wagon (which Clark was forced to buy) and start their journey from Chicago to California.
While the Griswolds certainly have an adventure, seeing sights like the St. Louis Arch, Colorado’s Rocky Mountains and the Grand Canyon, fun might not be the best word to describe their experience. Ellen’s bad-mannered Aunt Edna and her unfriendly dog, Dinky, join the family for a portion of their trip; the family repeatedly gets swindled out of money; and Clark’s distracted driving strands the whole family in the Arizona desert.
And that’s not the only thing that distracts him.
No matter their difficulties, however, Clark’s determination to have family fun at Walley World never wavers. And the Griswolds walk away with lifelong memories—some good, some not so good.
For all the chaos Clark puts his family through, his primary goal is to spend time with them. “The whole idea of a family vacation is to spend time together as a family,” he tells them. Despite the chaos of this infamous cross-country drive, Clark’s original intentions are good.
Clark prays over a woman after she dies. In the prayer, he talks about Hindus and Karma. Ellen also prays over the dead woman, including some passive aggressive comments about her husband.
In an angry outburst, Clark says, “Praise Marty Moose.”
In the car while their children are asleep, Clark and Ellen reminisce about a sexual encounter they had in college. On their pitstops, Clark and Ellen often have intimate moments. In one scene, Rusty and Audrey walk in on their parents making love on the bedroom floor. Ellen and Clark share some passionate kisses, and a girl tells Audrey she knows how to French kiss. When Audrey replies that everyone knows how to do that, the girl explains that her dad says she’s really good at French kissing.
While Ellen takes a shower, Clark pulls open the curtains, and her uncovered top half is shown. He asks if he can “do” her front, and Ellen retorts that Clark should “do” his own front. Ellen wears revealing pajamas that just barely cover critical areas. When the Griswolds visit Ellen’s brother-in-law, Uncle Eddie, both his son and daughter wear cropped shirts showing their midsections. Audrey tells her parents that Rusty sleeps in his underwear, and Clark is seen in his underwear when he walks around the Arizona desert.
Clark repeatedly flirts with a younger woman while his wife is sleeping in the car, behavior that’s treated as a joke by the movie. In one instance, the woman dances suggestively for him. Later, Clark meets her at a hotel bar and tells her that Ellen isn’t his wife. They go to a hotel pool where the woman strips in front of him and skinny dips with him. (We see both of them in their undergarments, but those last bits of clothing are removed off camera.) While the details of their bodies cannot be entirely distinguished under the water, both Clark and the other woman are naked, and their skin can partly be seen.
Ellen, Audrey and Rusty (along with the whole motel) see Clark and the woman skinny-dipping. Clark attempts to explain his cheating to Rusty saying, “When you get older, you get these feelings.” And when Clark apologizes about the situation to his wife, she apologizes for being “boring” and immediately forgives him. Then, she takes Clark to the pool to skinny dip. There, she takes off her shirt, and she is seen topless. Clark is also seen without his shirt.
Eddie’s son and Rusty look at porn magazines, and women in their underwear are seen on the covers. The boys then discuss “using” the porn magazines, and there’s a reference to masturbation.
After Clark crashes the car, Audrey says that she thinks she just got her period. And after an argument with Ellen, Clark goes to a bar and flirts with several women.
Clark’s distracted driving causes problems. While he is driving at night, Clark falls asleep at the wheel, nearly hitting pedestrians and narrowly avoiding crashes. In another scene, Clark crashes in the desert, and Rusty’s nose starts to bleed. When Clark walks through the desert in search of help, he sees a human skeleton.
Driving through a suburb, the Griswold’s hear a gunshot. In another small town, a bartender fires a gun after Clark calls him names. Clark buys a gun and threatens a security guard. Later, he shoots this man in the behind. He forces another man to sit and lie down while pointing the gun at him. Police officers point guns at several people.
Although it’s not shown, we learn that a character tied a dog to their car’s bumper and had forgotten to untie the animal before driving. A character mentions having to clean up the carcass. Another character refers to the culprit as a “dog killer.”
Aunt Edna slaps Clark when he tries to help her into the car. Frustrated by Aunt Edna’s complaining, Ellen threatens to punch her if she gets out of the car. A police officer tells Clark that if he hadn’t been in uniform, he would have split Clark’s skull. Another policeman searches Ellen, and she slaps his hands. Clark punches a moose statue. Aunt Edna’s dog, Dinky, bites Clark and Rusty’s ankles.
A character dies in her sleep, and her companions strap her body to the top of their car. When they are unable to find anyone to take her, the companions leave her corpse on someone’s doorstep.
Characters use harsh language liberally, including eight uses of the f-word, six uses of the s-word, two misuses of Jesus’ name and eight misuses of God’s name (paired with “d–” four times). There are also four uses of “a–” (including once written on a postcard), two uses of “a–hole,” four uses of “d–n,” seven uses of “h—,” two uses of “jeez” and single uses of “b–ch” and “crap.”
A man calls a bartender an “ornery cuss.” While Audrey and Rusty fight in the backseat, Audrey calls Rusty a “retard.” We hear some crude sexual slang, too.
Several characters drink alcohol and go to bars. Clark takes his family to a Western-style bar and orders beers for all of them (including the kids). And when they get stranded in the desert, Clark shares a beer with Rusty, who easily downs the whole drink. Clark instructs Rusty to not let his mom smell beer on his breath.
Vicki, Uncle Eddie’s daughter, gives Audrey some of her marijuana, and she attempts to smoke it. A man smokes in a bar.
Clark refuses to admit when he’s wrong to Ellen. After feeling forced into purchasing a car he doesn’t want, he pretends that the Griswold’s new car is the perfect vehicle for the road trip.
Rusty and Audrey can be disrespectful to their parents. In one scene, Rusty continues to play video games after Clark tells him to stop, and he props his feet on Clark’s car headrest. While Clark and Ellen sing road-trip songs, Rusty and Audrey pretend to choke themselves.
Another recurring joke is that Clark can’t remember his daughter’s name, and Clark says he would rather see a pile of mud than Ellen’s brother-in-law, Eddie. Clark and Ellen argue, sometimes yelling during their fights. In one big outburst, Clark insults Ellen and then storms out of their hotel room.
The movie portrays theft as a joke. For example, a group of men steals the hubcaps from Clark’s car as a person gives them directions, and these people also spray paint the phrase “honky lips” on the car. In desperation, Clark steals cash from a hotel and runs away.
A man tells Clark to “watch out for the Indians” on their road trip. Another man assumes that the people who attacked his property were Arabs.
In one scene, the family eats sandwiches. Later, they learn a dog had urinated on these sandwiches.
National Lampoon’s Vacation, now in theaters to “celebrate” its 40th anniversary, has not aged well. While modern entertainment obviously still contains objectionable content of all kinds, I suspect most audiences today would agree that Clark’s treatment of his wife (and all women for that matter) is completely unacceptable. The movie makes light of a man cheating, and seemingly asserts that the woman’s nagging led him to these immoral actions.
For a movie about a family, National Lampoon’s Vacation paints a highly dysfunctional picture of what those close-knit relationships should look like. While Clark seems like a decent father for treating his wife and kids to a nice vacation, his immaturity, immorality and selfishness undercut that gesture.
The premise of a “family vacation gone wrong” had the potential to send audiences into laughing fits about relatable mishaps. Unfortunately, National Lampoon’s Vacation’s reliance on sexual comedy, jocular violence and profanity will probably have most families shaking their heads instead. And many gags audiences might have laughed at four decades ago don’t seem nearly as funny in 2023.
