National Lampoon's Animal House

Rating:
Summary: Fraternity Life
Review: Released in 1978, this film remains one of the funniest movies ever produced. It rivals the comedy of Mel Brooks. Set in the late 1960's the film takes an exaggerated look at college life. John "Bluto" Blutarsky played by John Belushi is a member of the Delta House fraternity. His antics are a reminder of what can happen when one spends more time partying than studying. His GPA hovers around the 0.1 mark and this is what makes him lovable. The dean of the college, Vernon Wormer (John Vernon) does his best to rid the college of the useless Delta House fraternity. As his plan to dissolve the fraternity begins to take shape, the members of Delta House take exception and hatch a plan of their own. This is where Belushi utters the most memorable line of the movie, "Did we give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?"
This is a must see movie for anyone who experienced fraternity life especially in the late 60's or early 70's. The sound track is an excellent vehicle to return the viewer to times gone by.

Rating:
Summary: Animal House
Review: National Lampoon's Animal House was released in color in 1978. John Belushi is the lead actor playing Bluto, who is a frat house drunk. This movie centers around the antics of the Delta house on a college campus. Animal House is set in 1960's on the Faber college campus. Bluto, Belushi, takes no prisoners when it comes to his antics. This movie is full of crude humor and is not for the 'weak' hearted. The Delta House is on 'double secret' probation (whatever that is) before they hold their toga party, which gets them kicked off campus.
This movie is full of lowbrow humor as the Delta House works against the 'normal clean-cut' students at Faber. They pull pranks on everyone, not even the Dean is safe from the Delta's, for example the dead horse in the Dean's office. The Deltas drink, party and womanize throughout the movie. Some of the scenes in this movie are so hard to believe, but are so funny. The end of this movie puts a good cap on things and ties everything together. Animal House is a movie for the college student at heart.

Rating:
Summary: This movie is a funfest!
Review: Title of film: National Lampoon's Animal House
Year Released: 1978
Running time: 109 minutes
Director/studio: John Landis/Universal Studios
Actors/Actresses: John Belushi......"Bluto"
Tim Matheson......"Otter"
John Vernon......."Dean Wormer"
Verna Bloom......."Marion Wormer"
Tom Hulce........."Pinto"
Cesare Danova....."The Mayor"
Peter Riegert....."Boon"
Mary Louise Weller...."Mandy Pepperidge
Stephen Furst........."Flounder" Dorfman
James Daughton........"Greg Marmalard"
Bruce McGill.........."D-Day"
Mark Metcalf.........."Douglas Neidermeyer"
Karen Allen..........."Katy Fuller"
James Widdoes........."Robert Hoover"
Martha Smith.........."Babs"
Lisa Baur............."Shelly Dubinsky"
Sarah Holcomb........."Clorette De Pasto"
Kevin Bacon..........."Chip Diller"
Donald Sutherland....."Professor Jennings"
Douglas Kenney........"Stork"
Chris Miller.........."Hardbar"
Bruce Bonnheim........"B.B."
Joshua Daniel........."Mothball"
Sunny Johnson........."Otters Co-ed"
Stacy Grooman........."Sissy"
Stephen Bishop........"Guy with guitar"
Eliza Roberts........."Brunella"
Aseneth Jurgenson....."Beth"
Katherine Denning....."Noreen"
Raymone Robinson......"Mean Dude"
Robert Elliott........"Meaner Dude"
Reginald Farmer......."Meanest Dude"
Jebidiah R. Dumas....."Gigantic Dude"
Priscilla Lauris......"Wormer's Secretary"
Rick Eby.............."Omega"
Nominations/Awards:
1979 Won People's Choice Award for Favorite Non-Musical Motion Picture
1979 Nominated WGS Screen Award Category/Recipients--Best Comedy Written Directly for the Screen
Douglas Kenney, Chris Miller (III), Harold Ramis

Faber College during fall fraternity pledge season is the place all young men want to be regardless of societal ranking. The disparity between two of the fraternities is quickly evident when we see the wealthy white young men recruiting look-a-likes to join their fraternity and snubbing wannabe's who don't quite measure up. The wealthy frat house has the approval of the school's Dean Wormer and he despises with a passion the characters who choose Delta House fraternity. Dean Wormer wants Delta House off of his campus and he asks Omega House (the rich boys) to help him accomplish this task. This is where the fun begins.

It doesn't take long for the viewer to realize that fun-loving, sloppy, middle-class guys inhabit Delta house and they live for pulling pranks on the Omega House fraternity and Dean Wormer.

This movie truly portrays college life on campuses during the 1970's. The underdog Delta House is only looking for acceptance and they won't stop at anything to achieve it! The pledge class consists of all the rejects from Omega House not only from this year but year's past. Together this group works together to undo Dean Wormer's wish to rid their house from his campus.

Flounder's experience with the horse is hysterical. The lunchroom scene with Bluto is classic. Otter's "happy-go-lucky" love interests including Dean Wormer's life are characteristic of a young man's college sexual escapades of the 70's. The closing of the Delta House and the road trip are comical. And finally the parade of all parades allows Delta House to get their revenge.

Scenes from this movie stay with you forever! Keep smiling as you relive quotes and replay scenes in your mind years after viewing this very funny film!

Rating:
Summary: Hilarious!!!
Review: This definitely is one of the funniest movies I have seen in a while!! Belushi is simply beyond any praise - he is absolutely fantastic in this parody of college life. The premise of the film is very simple: a mean dean of the Faber college is trying to wipe out the fraternity that routinely causes more trouble than all the rest altogether. Infinite rowdy jokes, comical situations, and brilliant quotable lines are to follow. This is one of the movies that doesn't really require a lengthy description - it's a complete riot and you are simply going to love it!!

Rating:
Summary: An ok transfer of a comedy classic
Review: Let me say that "Animal House" is in my opinion one of the best comedies ever made. Now for the downside to the collector's edition. The video transfer is good but it's far from top-notch. With that said let me tackle the audio which is a bit of a dissapoinment. I've never heard such an overabundance of tape hiss in my life (it's so thick that you can cut it with a knife). Universal should have digitally cleaned up the audio portion of this otherwise good dvd presentation. Shame! Shame! Universal should hang their collective heads. On a final note the extra's are nice.

Rating:
Summary: INCREDIBLE ACTING PERFORMANCE BY JOHN BELUSHI...
Review: Turn off the lights,grab a brew and let Bluto Blutarsky bring your house down.

Rating:
Summary: Funniest Movie Ever
Review: When people ask me to name my top 10 movies, they are always astonished when I say Animal House is on the list. This is a hilarious film and every scene works virtually on its own. Some of my favorite lines: "Seven years of college down the drain." "Food fight!" "Did we give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?" You cannot fully appreciate this movie when it is shown on TV because so many things have to be cut. My solution is to own the movie. Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Don't Mess With The Delta House!
Review: "Animal House" is the grand daddy of all College Party Movies! With an all-star cast of comedians headed by John Belushi, this fraternity house free-for-all puts the punch back into punch line. Enjoy the golden oldies of the early 60s, especially the cameo by The Contours (who sang "Do You Love Me?"). The ending, where the guys from Delta House get even is pure fun! Bring back your college party-days with this classic comedy!

Rating:
Summary: OVER-RATED
Review: This has got to be the most-OVERRATED comedies of all time,I have no idea why everyone haved been raving about this silly SO-CALLED CULT-CLASSIC,sure that's what i expect from a movie like this and i do enjoy the genre,but the cookie-cutter script just frankly lacks BREAK-AWAY humor and the humor is too dull for my taste,I'll go with PORKYS,FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT or REVENGE of the NERDS anyday!! not to mention the LACK-LUSTER transfer of the DVD.

Rating:
Summary: You are a P-I-G, Pig!
Review: With that phrase, Mandy defines both Bluto and herself. In doing so she also defines the range of the movie. Immediately afterward, John "Bluto" Belushi smacks his over stuffed cheeks and sprays mashed potatos on his critics. "I'm a zit. Get it?" This is followed by the classic food fight.

With such humor, how can one go wrong? This appeals to the teenaged boy in everyone.

I first saw this film in a theater when newly released. It had little publicity and I was one of only 10-12 people. However, the story was so engaging and the 60s atmosphere (when I went to college) accurate enough that I brought a friend back the next week. That time the theater was full. Word-of-mouth had filled the place. This is rare. Usually a film arrives with ballyhoo and packed seats and slides down-hill from there. Animal House only picked up steam as more people realized how much fun it was.

It's humor has permeated our culture. Toga parties and road trips may not have been everyone's experience in the 60s but by the 80s Animal House alone had made them familiar to all. In doing so it made John Belushi a star. There are plenty of familiar faces in this movie. It's other stars did not all rise to the level of Belushi, but you saw them for years and would say "that's Otter!" without having a clue who the actor was. Many of the people in this film became type-cast. For John Belushi it was a bonanza. For the others it may have been a disaser. Who wants to spend a career as "Flounder" or "Pinto"? Yet that's pretty much what happened.

The film is not brilliant cinema. It's not deep. It's just fun. It unleashes the little gremlins in all of us, that little part of the psyche which says "what I would REALLY like to do is..."

My favorite scene is when the balladeer is strumming his guitar on the stairs of the Delta House and singing to two adoring girls "I gave my love a cherry". Bluto grabs the guitar and smashes it. How often have you wished to do that? (What? Never? Then go back to Steel Magnolias and never mind.........)

This may have been National Lampoon's first foray into film and they were wise enough to get young John Landis to make it. Fresh from Kentucky Fried Movie, Landis would peak (in my opinion) with Blues Brothers the following year. His other films have been a gradual descent from these early heights.

The film also benefits from the writing of Doug Kenney and Harold Ramis. Kenney died a few years later, shortly after helping Ramis write Caddy Shack, but Ramis became famous after writing and appearing in Ghostbusters as Egon Spengler. His comedy writing talents helped create Stripes, Back To School, Groundhog Day, Analyze This, and Bedazzled.

The "free love" and mayhem of Animal House may seem anachronistic in the 21st century but it is a valuable window into that generation of film makers, as well as the prior generation whom they portray. The story is set in the 60s and is laced with the music and lifestyles of the time. It is a reversal of the typical Hollywood "morality play" for the bad guys do get their just desserts, but the heros are, by current standards, degenerates, while the villians would currently be considered upright citizens conforming to a 50s standard which was fading at the time of the story, but which (in some regards) has now made a resurgence in the form of rampant political correctness today.

Animal House is the antithesis of political correctness. If you've never seen it, it's a world expanding experience. If you grew up with it, it's just plain fun. See it again.