Merry Christmas! We’ve reached Christmas Day for 2025 and I wish anyone visiting my blog to have a most Merry Christmas or that you had a wonderful Hanukkah season. I’m reprising my annual look at the best Christmas movie ever: “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” and here we go …
Remember, Christmas is today and Hanukkah just ended! Of course, no matter your faith or how you celebrate the season, there’s just one movie to watch today. It is the greatest-ever Christmas movie: “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” starring Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo.
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A promotional still photograph from the movie “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.” - CLICK here … for all my reviews of movies
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Forget those “Christmas classics” in black-and-white with the angels and a bell and having a wonderful life on 34th street or some such nonsense. The modern Christmas season is defined by this film that is 35 years old with this Christmas season!
‘National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation’
(1989; 97 minutes; rated PG-13; directed by Jeremiah Chechik and starring Chevy Chase, Beverly D’Angelo, Randy Quaid and Johnny Galecki)
“Christmas Vacation” is the story of one man’s dream of a most wonderful Christmas season in which his family and his in-laws come together at his house for an enjoyable time! Ha! Thankfully for the audience, to label the “Griswolds” as dysfunctional would be a compliment.
You know the story and I know the story and we’ll all be playing the film non-stop today in competition with the marathon for that other great holiday film: “A Christmas Story” from director Bob Clark.
Now, let me look back at my origins with “Christmas Vacation” …
It was with great anticipation and an expectance of greatness when I went to see “Christmas Vacation” on Dec. 1, 1989. It was taken from a National Lampoon short story titled “Christmas ’59” that was written by legendary director/writer John Hughes, who also adapted the original story to become the film’s screenplay.
Here’s a blurb from my review: … both “National Lampoon’s Vacation” and “Christmas Vacation” are adapted for the screen by Hughes from short stories he wrote for the “National Lampoon” humor magazine. For those who were children in the late 1950s, the stories are priceless mirrors and something we can all relate to. You can click here to read Hughes’ original short story titled “Christmas ’59.” The Christmas story was the sequel short story to his original “Vacation ’58” short (click here to read it). Unlike the short story, the movie “Vacation” doesn’t mention that All-American founder of the mouse empire (they didn’t under threat of litigation by that company).
Let me close out my annual recommendation of “Christmas Vacation” on Christmas Day by noting that you can find it on streaming services, on Blu-Ray disk, on DVD disk and on movie channel grids on your tee-vee and, so, today …
… Merry Christmas and have a happy New Year!
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