Jeremiah S. Chechik
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Krampus (2015)
Directed by Michael Dougherty
influenced by National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989)
Plot Themes
Once the plot kicks in — or more correctly, the set-up for the plot — what we get is basically a retread of National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (1989).
The film starts out like National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, when a frazzled family – dad Tommy (Scott), mom Sarah (Collette), their two kids, and Grandma Omi (Krista Stadler) – welcome their freeloading, rude relatives over to enjoy some Christmas cheer.
That’s the macabre message of “Krampus,” a bizarre B-movie horror take on “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.”
If 1989's "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation" saw the dysfunctional, madcap misadventures of the Griswold clan interrupted by a giant horned monster and his gaggle of murderous toys and evil elves, it would uncannily resemble "Krampus."
Shot in New Zealand (doubling for Anytown, USA), this seasonal horror-comedy starts off as something of a riff on National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, and then heads into Gremlins territory before it finally unleashes the titular Germanic Santa Claws, where things get really nasty.
As Dougherty makes clear by early allusion, this is A Christmas Carol for Poltergeist fans with more than a chunk of National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation thrown in for good measure.
The script, by director Shane Black and Drew Pearce, is set shortly after the events of “The Avengers,” though there’s a brief prologue referencing a New Year’s party back in 1999.
The last half hour provides enough spectacular action sequences (including a stormy duel reminiscent of the one in The Empire Strikes Back) to reward a young viewer who might have endured the awkward dialogue (loaded with innuendos) and uncomfortable overdose of strangeness (giant teddy bears, anyone?) that ran rampant for the first sixty minutes.
Terrible reviews and public indifference not only contributed to the demise of The Avengers but caused studios to steer clear of a similar treatment for The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
Ms. Collins, by the way, is played by Diana Rigg, who died a year ago, just a few months after filming finished, and whose secret agent character Emma Peel from TV’s The Avengers embodied everything that was British and sexy and adventurous and not Sean Connery in the 1960s.
Kingsman: The Golden Circle (2017)
Directed by Matthew Vaughn
influenced by The Avengers (1998)
Characters
Director Matthew Vaughn’s decision to cast Colin Firth as a sort of dapper, dangerous fusion of Patrick Macnee in The Avengers and Wolverine at his most kill-crazy was the sort of eccentric, esoteric touch that distinguished it from its Hollywood competition and helped make it a huge box-office hit.
And so we have 21 Jump Street, which is based on the Fox series of the same name that ran from 1987 to 1991 and is now best known as the launching pad for Johnny Depp, who spent his early film career purposefully choosing oddball roles in films like Cry-Baby (1990), Edward Scissorhands (1990), and Benny & Joon (1993) to distance himself from the teen pin-up idol the industry was trying to turn him into.
Eileen Atkins, the redoubtable comic actress of Cold Comfort Farm, aces a few brief appearances but her character is not allowed to continue much.
Original director Jeremiah S. Chechik ("National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation") told Walker to rewrite the script with the Gwyneth-Paltrow's-head-in-the-box scene taken out.
Elf (2003)
Directed by Jon Favreau
influenced by National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989)
Themes
There are two holiday comedies I pretty much have to watch every year: National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation and A Christmas Story.
An utterly feeble and dispiriting flop that wastes not only a trio of casting coups but, in set designer Stuart Craig (of Dangerous Liaisons and The English Patient , to name two triumphs), one of the greatest eye-poppers at work in the commercial cinema.
My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown (1989)
Directed by Jim Sheridan
influenced The Avengers (1998)
Jim Broadbent (The Crying Game) and the great Fiona Shaw (My Left Foot) make appearances as corrupt henchmen named Mother—that's him—and Father—that's her.
Jim Broadbent (The Crying Game) and the great Fiona Shaw (My Left Foot) make appearances as corrupt henchmen named Mother—that's him—and Father—that's her.
The production team of Susan Arnold and Donna Roth have a history with unusual stories such as "Benny & Joon" and my favorite, "Unstrung Heroes", so I wasn't too surprised to find that when John Cusack approached them with Tom Jankiewicz's script, they let him run with it.
Stars Ralph Fiennes, Uma Thurman, and Sean Connery may seem well-positioned to breathe life into a tongue-in-cheek action pic derived from these most stylish, rough-and-tumble icons of British urbanity, but who thought that director Jeremiah Chechik (1996's atrocious Diabolique ) and screenwriter Don MacPherson (Absolute Beginners) were the ones to pull it off?