{"id":2601,"date":"2024-08-20T18:32:14","date_gmt":"2024-08-20T18:32:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=2601"},"modified":"2024-10-13T19:44:38","modified_gmt":"2024-10-13T23:44:38","slug":"national-lampoons-animal-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/08\/20\/national-lampoons-animal-house\/","title":{"rendered":"National Lampoon\u2019s Animal House"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"National Lampoon\u2019s Animal House<\/strong> (1978)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Universal\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 109 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (language, nudity, crude and sexual content, alcohol and drug use, partying)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: John Landis\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Harold Ramis, Douglas Kenney and Chris Miller\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Elmer Bernstein\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Charles Correll\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: July 28, 1978 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: John Belushi, Tim Matheson, Peter Riegert, Thomas Hulce, Stephen Furst, Bruce McGill, James Widdoes, James Daughton, Mark Metcalf, Kevin Bacon, John Vernon, Verna Bloom, Donald Sutherland, Karen Allen, Mary Louise Weller, Martha Smith, Sarah Holcomb, Douglas Kenney, DeWayne Jessie, Cesar Danova, Stephen Bishop.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $141.6M (US)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ****<\/p>\n

A comedy classic! The quintessential college comedy of my generation! The original \u201csnobs vs. slobs\u201d flick! A high-ranking entry on many a parent\u2019s \u201cNO WAY!\u201d movie list! Define it how you will, there\u2019s no denying National Lampoon\u2019s Animal House<\/strong> made an enormous impact on both youth culture and the comedy landscape.<\/p>\n

\u00a0It\u2019s a groundbreaking film on many different levels, the most obvious being how it paved the way for outrageous comedies aimed at the teen market (e.g. Meatballs, Caddyshack, Stripes, Porky\u2019s, Bachelor Party and Revenge of the Nerds). It made an instant movie star out of John Belushi, one of the original SNL players. It inspired a wave of toga parties at colleges across the country. Along with the previous year\u2019s The Kentucky Fried Movie (also directed by Landis), it launched the \u201cgross-out\u201d genre of comedy movies. It\u2019s endlessly quotable. Who doesn\u2019t remember the famous \u201cFood fight!\u201d cry?<\/p>\n

\u00a0The very best thing about Animal House<\/strong> is that it\u2019s absolutely hilarious from start to finish. This simple, vulgar tale of a misfit fraternity taking on the strict, uptight college dean and a prestigious, stuck-up fraternity made a ton of money. It also inspired at least three failed TV sitcoms and two aborted attempts at a sequel. It\u2019s a formula that\u2019s been repeated countless times in the 45+ years since it first roared into theaters. Rarely, if ever, has the formula worked as perfectly as it does in this wild, messy, anarchic comedy full of unforgettable characters and insane situations. It\u2019s easily one of the best comedies of all time.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Set at fictional Faber College in 1962, misfit freshmen Larry Kroger (Hulce, Amadeus) and Kent Dorfman (Furst, Midnight Madness) are looking to join a fraternity. They quickly find they\u2019re not welcome at snooty Omega Theta Pi where the prissy hostess refers to them as \u201ca wimp and a blimp.\u201d Kent suggests they pledge Delta Tau Chi where his older brother was once a member making him a legacy.<\/p>\n

\u00a0They arrive at the frat house where they find drunken member Bluto (Belushi) urinating outside. Upon entering Delta House, we see it really lives up to the movie\u2019s title. It\u2019s a zoo in there. There\u2019s a wild rush party going on and everybody is having a grand old time. That\u2019s where Larry and Kent meet the other Delta members including chapter president Robert Hoover (TV director Widdoes), rush chairman Eric \u201cOtter\u201d Stratton (Matheson, Up the Creek), Boon (Riegert, Local Hero), and biker D-Day (McGill, The Last Boy Scout). The boys get invited to pledge and receive the names \u201cPinto\u201d and \u201cFlounder.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0Meanwhile, nasty Dean Wormer (Vernon, Dirty Harry) wants nothing more than to revoke Delta\u2019s charter and kick every one of them out of Faber. He\u2019s had it with their wild behavior and low grades for which they are already on probation. The only way to do it is to place them on \u201cdouble secret probation\u201d and hope to catch them in the act of something immoral or lascivious. He puts sneaky Omega president Greg Marmalard (Daughton, Spies Like Us) and ROTC officer Douglas C. Neidermeyer (Metcalf, One Crazy Summer) on it. So begins the war between the slobs and the snobs in which only one side can emerge victorious.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Among the comic highlights are a prank involving Neidermeyer\u2019s prized horse, a road trip that takes the guys to an all-black bar and a homecoming parade that quickly descends into chaos after the Deltas crash it. The centerpiece of Animal House<\/strong> is the infamous<\/strong> toga party at which ladies\u2019 man Otter seduces Mrs. Wormer (Bloom, High Plains Drifter). In the midst of it all, Boon must decide between his drunken frat buddies and his steady girlfriend Katy (Allen, Raiders of the Lost Ark), frustrated at his refusal to grow up and act like an adult.<\/p>\n

\u00a0There are so many great scenes and classic lines in Animal House<\/strong> that to list even half of them would take up way more space than I\u2019ve allotted for this review. I suppose the first one that comes to mind is Bluto\u2019s impassioned speech to his fellow frat members after learning they\u2019ve all been expelled. He references the Germans bombing Pearl Harbor. It\u2019s nice to see he learned something during his seven years at college. I\u2019d also have to cite the scene where Larry wrestles with his conscience, represented by visions of an angel and a demon, when confronted with taking advantage of his drunk and passed-out date (Holcomb, Caddyshack) at the toga party. Okay, just one more. The infamous scene featuring Bluto loading up his tray and pockets at the cafeteria food line followed by his famous impersonation of a zit-that\u2019s freaking comedy gold!<\/p>\n

\u00a0Belushi is awesome in Animal House<\/strong> which makes it even sadder that his career was cut short by a fatal drug overdose just four years later. He was the very personification of anarchy. The whole cast is great including Donald Sutherland (M*A*S*H) as the liberal-minded, pot-smoking English professor.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I can\u2019t think of a single bad thing to say about Animal House<\/strong> except it was five years before I saw it uncut. I saw it on a double feature with The Blues Brothers (December 17, 1983) at the old Waverly Theater. This is one movie that DEFINITELY holds up to repeat viewings. It\u2019s funny every single time you watch it. It richly deserves its R rating with its raunchy gags and sexual humor. I remember asking to see it when it first came out and my father saying, \u201cIt\u2019s not for you!\u201d I beg to differ, Dad.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Although it\u2019s one of the funniest movies I\u2019ve ever seen, I don\u2019t include it in my top ten best comedies for one reason. It exists on a plane of its own with its spiritual brethren The Blues Brothers and Caddyshack. They make up the Holy Trinity of Comedy. Landis struck gold with Animal House<\/strong>. <\/strong>It still holds up after all these years as the best LOL college comedy EVER!\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

National Lampoon\u2019s Animal House (1978)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Universal\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 109 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (language, nudity, crude and sexual content, alcohol and drug use, partying)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: John Landis\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Harold Ramis, Douglas Kenney and Chris Miller\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Elmer Bernstein\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Charles Correll\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: July 28, 1978 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: John Belushi, Tim Matheson, Peter Riegert, Thomas Hulce, Stephen […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3420,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2601","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-thats-some-funny-stuff"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Animal-House-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2601"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2601\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3421,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2601\/revisions\/3421"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3420"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}