With the holiday season finally here, it’s time to watch all of our favorite Christmas movies before they go out of season again, and one film that comes up in all the best Christmas film lists is “Christmas Vacation.” But how has this film held up 33 years after its initial release?

“Christmas Vacation” is a unique Christmas film by it being a part of an already established franchise as opposed to the norm of having a one off or series created revolving around the Christmas season. This creates a fun opportunity to allow the audience to see characters that we already know face seasonal challenges that we don’t normally see with most comedy series outside of holiday specials on television.

“Christmas Vacation” differs from the other “National Lampoon” vacation movies before it by actually having the Griswold family stay at home this time around as opposed to them going on a road trip or flying internationally for their chicanery. This allows for the audience to get a better grasp on what the family is like in normal everyday life, such as when we see their family’s house and the occupations that they hold.

When “Christmas Vacation” released on December 1st, 1989, it didn’t just act as a Christmas movie, but it acted as an unofficial end to the National Lampoon Vacation trilogy and more importantly it marked the end of the golden era of spoof comedies in Hollywood. The late 70’s and early 80’s was a special time for over-the-top comedies like “Airplane,” “Caddyshack,” “Naked Gun,” “Three Amigos,” and “The Vacation,” films that were all amongst the top of the comedy film genre. But just like every other golden era, its run of dominance came to an end in favor of the genre going in more of a realistic setting with comedies making fun of everyday life instead of the overtop slapstick humor of the 80’s.

With all that being said, Christmas Vacation has held its own very well over the past couple of decades and makes for a great film to watch with your family over the holidays this year.