NATIONAL LAMPOON'S CLASS REUNION

US, 1982, 81 minutes, Colour.
Gerrit Graham, Michael Lerner.
Directed by Michael Miller.

National Lampoon's Class Reunion is an attempt to follow up the financially successful and very popular National Lampoon's Animal House.

However, this comedy is very restrained in high jinks, language and its capacity to offend. Rather, it is a parody of the Halloween and Grease traditions. There is a demented killer and the explanation is given. There is a range of adolescents allegedly grown up by ten years with their class reunion in 1982 after finishing high school in 1972. The group of characters, however, offers the opportunity for Gerritt Grahame to be the strong looking American hero who is weak and cowardly and for the bespectacled nonentity to become the hero. There are satiric presentations of the heroines of horror films and soap operas. The film is particularly effective in some funny satiric one-liners and in the parody of the Halloween scares. While not as clever as such parodies as Flying High or Young Doctors in Love, it is superior to a similar parody, Wacko.

Screenplay is by John Hughes before he started directing.