Caddyshack *** (1980, Chevy Chase, Rodney Dangerfield, Ted Knight, Bill Murray, Michael O’Keefe) – Classic Movie Review 3456

Caddyshack is a funny game of feuding at a snooty golf club, with par-for-the-course characters in a supercilious president, the cheeky professional, the rude ground-keeper, the aspiring caddy and the vulgar millionaire owner.

Co-writer/director Harold Ramis’s 1980 comedy is a smutty and juvenile, but sometimes very funny set of gags on the golf course. It gets a big lift from the amusing performances from Chevy Chase, Rodney Dangerfield, Ted Knight and Bill Murray, all experts in coarse farce.

Entertaining though the humans are, the slackly-scripted show is stolen by the animated gopher. Even if Brian Doyle-Murray, Douglas Kenney and Ramis’s script’s misses are too numerous to mention, the movie is still surprisingly funny.

It could have been called National Lampoon’s Club House, so you know what to expect.

Also in the cast are Michael O’Keefe, Albert Salmi, Cindy Morgan, Henry Wilcoxon as the bishop, Sarah Holcomb, Scott Colomby and Brian Doyle-Murray (Bill Murray’s brother and one of the co-writers).

Caddyshack II followed in 1988 in a belated (and unwanted) sequel with an unrelated story and Jackie Mason having the whole thing to himself as a blunt millionaire who introduces his daughter to a posh golf club, upsetting the snooty members.

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 3456

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