Vacances de folie

All I have to say is Kathleen Kinmont and Barbra Crampton's scene is worth the rental alone!!! But anyways, This is a pretty fun and entertaining 80's teen comedy with an all-star cast. Tim Robbins, Stephan Geoffreys (Fright Night), and Cameron Dye (Valley Girl) are three buddies from Ohio State who travel to Palm Springs to spend spring break. There happens to be some rival frat guys there on vacation too. Eventually they make a bet to see which one could get laid first. There are some classic lines and some unexpectedly funny moments. Geoffreys (who went on to do pornography) is yet again playing the weird and bizarre nerd role (much like Fright night). Amanda Bearse his Fright Night co-star even pops up in the film. You get scream queens Crampton (re-animator) and Kinmont(Halloween4) nude together in the same scene and there is some decent t&a through out. Tim Robbins and Cameron Dye are the real leads of the film and both do a great job playing the horny frat guys. John Vernon is great as usual as the hard-nosed Sheriff who hates vacationers.

One of my favorite pastimes is scanning old pawn shops and video stores for movies that are long out of print and fit firmly in cheezy genres like campy horror or teen sex romps. Thankfully, cheap DVD pressings of these movies are starting to surface more and more often. I picked up this title at Walmart for $2.88 Canadian.

It's neat to see Tim Robbins in one of his earlier roles. The movie itself is quite watchable, but far from a masterpiece of comedy. The acting is not as bad as some I have seen and there are a few laughs. Pick this one up if you get the chance. It's got a pretty good soundtrack (if you like 80's cheese)and a no brainer plot whose twists you can spot from 20 miles away. The DVD is a really clean print and is not filled with digital artifacts like so many of these cheaper releases. The audio (music and dialogue) is crisp and well mastered. COnsidering this film is nearly 20 years old, I was surprised that I hadn't heard of it sooner. It dosen't quite have the potential for a cult classic, being inferior to Animal House and Ski School, but it would be fun at a party. Tim Robbins is really great and gets quite a bit of screen time. The women are quite attractive and there is some gratuitous nudity (classic 80's formula).

Fraternity Vacation is the classic teen comedy that follows 'Mother' (Tim Robbins) and Joe (Cameron Dye), two fraternity boys, utilizing nerdy Wendell (Stephen Geoffreys) whose parents' promise of helping their fraternity if they "teach him a few of the tricks of the trade" will have them spending time in sunny Palm Springs committed to their mission but also on trying to win a bet with two rival fraternity members.

You can tell how influential movies like this were for what would later come in the late 90s and 2000s. Teens doing what they like better: partying, chasing romantic interests, drinking, pulling pranks, etc. As usual in movie of those years, the actors weren't exactly young enough to play these roles: Tim Robbins had 27 years when the movie came out; Cameron Dye 26.

One of the things the movie does well is in keeping you engaged since it is a very eventful movie despite the natural lacks of its kind. When the trio arrives at Palm Springs, they lose no time and go to the swimming pool to meet some ladies. It doesn't take long for two girls to approach them and what began in chit chat progresses to the boy's room where Mother and Joe's euphoria upon ogling the attractive Marianne (Kathleen Kinmont) and Chrissie (Barbara Crampton) would make the Cheshire Cat's smile pale in comparison. The fun continues when the duo meets Charles (Leigh McCloskey) and J. C. (Matt McCoy), members of a rival fraternity, and they suggest the idea of betting on who they consider the most attractive girl, Ashley (Sheree J. Wilson). The first one to be with her wins 1000$.

Fraternity Vacation leans on silly jokes and prejudices to produce humor, some of the times succeeding, other times not so much. It is full of implausible events as most of these movies, rushed situations, underdeveloped characters, and simplistic unpretentious aims. Nonetheless it manages to be better than most of its kind where bad-taste humor consists of the go-to formula. Comparing Fraternity Vacation to something like American Pie would be like comparing Caviar to a Hot Dog.

When I found this movie at a local pawn shop for a buck, I was really surprised I had never heard of an 80's sex comedy that had the likes of Tim Robbins, Stephen Geoffreys, Amanda Bearse, Barbara Crampton, Kathleen Kinmont and John Vernon in it.

While it has a great cast, I found the film to be mediocre in general. I got a few good laughs out of it, but I have seen many other sex comedies from this era which were way funnier and memorable. Though I will say the shared topless scene between Kinmont and Crampton is worth the price of admission alone.

If you're a fan of dumb 80's comedies loaded with beers and babes, you could do much worse than this, but you could also do a little better.

This is one of the worst movies I've ever seen, yet it was still entertaining. It represents everything that was bad in the 80's: sex comedies, college or high school related "exploitation" movies, "resort" movies. To some people it might be "delightfully" bad. This is why I'm not going to completely diss this goofy movie.

You know the plot, you've seen it in other movies of this genre. A group of college kids are going on a vacation with only one thing on their mind: sex. The rest of the movie is just useless frills. What makes this movie so appealing [ yeah, there is some kind of appeal to it.. ] is the fact that it's so goofy and stupid. If this movie was made today, it would probably be offensive.

Oh, another good point: the main character who is a shy innocent charming nerd who doesn't know much about girls. [ aww ]

If you just want an awful movie to watch with your friends and laugh at, this might be a good choice.