Christmas Vacation 2: Cousin Eddie's Island Adventure (2003)

I am suprised at all the negative reviews and people claiming it it was the worst movie they ever saw - they have not seen "Santa Claus vs the Martians" or "The Waterboy". It is bad but amusing; it follows a formula unfortunately the execution is lacking. Randy Quaid overacts while the others have one dimensional roles. Quaid was great in the LBJ movie so I cut him some slack. Ed Asner must have been hard up to take on this role.The sexual harrassment the Lee character receives does not belong in a movie - it was not funny. Having the parts included may give an insight into how Hollywood thinks this kind of thing is acceptable; It may be indicative of why there are greater problems in the industry.

In some way I suspect Warner Brothers made this movie so it would flop. Then they could make the fans go away that nag them about why they're not going to make another Vacation sequel with all the Griswalds and the National Lampoon guy Matty Simmons producing it. It had its funny moments. I liked the scene where Eddie tried to catch a big fish and reel it in. It was so large that it pulled the boat backwards toward their deserted island. Also, it got me laughing when Eddie's son and his uncle (Ed Asner) peek at their Hawaian host undressing both at the same time. If anything that rated one to zero it was the extra feature about the making of the film that focused on training the animals, Eddie's favorite types of beer and how many different ways the cast members could say "Merry Christmas." Audrey said "Merry Christmas, I wanna kill myself!" Yuck. Avoid the extra feature because it told what was fake in the movie besides what already looked cheap and fake.

Note, I only saw approximately the last half of this movie, so feel free to take my review with whatever grain of salt you deem appropriate, that being said, seeing what I saw was more than enough to make me quite convinced that a one-star rating for this is enough.In short, it's a dismal-plot slaughter of the wonderful precursor (NL Christmas Vacation) with Chevy Chase, only it doesn't have Chevy Chase in it, and it takes place in a generic tropical island, essentially with no connection to Christmas at all.Ol' Chevy probably didn't want in because the plot is that devoid of actual fun, instead they got the screwy Cousin Eddie, who, again, was great in the original, but in this he is just over the top, and an extremely poor basis for any movie considering the plot and acting. The attempts at humor are generic to a degree where even contemporary television comedy trumps it, and considering that this is supposed to be comedy, I doubt I need to say more.This is not to be seen for its qualities, for it has none, but for it's failings and again, how Hollywood is spilling it's life's blood of the past in the pursuit of a quick buck.I think I'll watch the original before the upcoming Christmas season just to try to regain my childhood innocence, from a lost time when motion pictures were more than just high-budget, but mindless, garbage.

I actually picked this DVD up by mistake at work this week mistaking it for the Chevy chase movie. I took it home watched it and loved it. I remember the other vacation movies showing last Christmas eve on t.v and i remember they were funny too. There was a reason that i liked this movie that i know a lot of people don't like for the one reason. It was b grade and low budget but i seem to like the b grade low budget flicks like they just click with me for some reason. Eric idles cameo was pretty cool. hadn't seen him in a while either and randy quad was funny as usual. If you like the other national lampoons movies you will enjoy this one. It had it moments.