Line #19 Film/NationalLampoonsEuropeanVacation


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/european_vacation_poster.jpg]]
2
3	->''"Oh the hills are alive with the sound of Griswald..."'''
4	-->-- '''Clark W. Griswald''' in an ImagineSpot
5
6	''National Lampoon's European Vacation'' is a 1985 comedy movie that serves as a direct sequel to ''Film/NationalLampoonsVacation''. Creator/ChevyChase and Creator/BeverlyDAngelo reprise their respective roles as Clark and Ellen Griswald, while [[TheOtherDarrin Dana Hill and Jason Lively]] assume the roles of the Griswald children.
7
8	After the Griswald family accidentally wins a European vacation courtesy of the popular game show ''[[ShowWithinAShow Pig in a Poke]]'', Clark drags them out of the house once again to see as many sights as possible in the iconic locations of London, Stonehenge, Paris, Germany, and Rome.
9	----
10	!!''European Vacation'' provides examples of:
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13	[[folder:A-M]]
14	* TheAllegedCar: The Citroen DS they use on the Continent has the usual Griswald-car body add-ons as well as mainly being used with its suspension at full height. The Austin Maxi they used in the UK, however, was 100% stock.
15	* AppealToObscurity: Discussed by Mrs. Froeger when her family gets to pick the next question on ''Pig in a Poke''. One available category is "Early Hungarian cabinet-making" and she suggests choosing it because "no one knows anything about Hungarians."[[note]]Likely deliberate, since the actress Cynthia Szigeti was herself of Hungarian descent.[[/note]]
16	* ArtisticLicenseHistory: The vacation of the title is won when the Griswalds/Griswolds are asked to name the captain who lead the Louisianna Purchase expedition and Ellen accidentally answers by shouting "Clark!" to get her husbands attention, which the host accepts as the right answer. While William Clark and Meriwether Lewis were both Captains, Lewis was the actual leader of the expedition with Clark being his second-in-command.
17	* BalloonBelly: During the flight, Audrey has a nightmare in which she starts to gorge on European foods and becomes so fat that she can't get out of her chair.
18	* BilingualBonus:
19	** Parts of the movie not in English are untranslated. One such scene is when Clark tells a German man that he and his family are looking for ''sechs'' (pronounced "zex" it is the German word for six and the house number of Clark's relatives), but Clark pronounces it "looking for sex". The man slams the door in his face while calling him "Schweinehund!", a German insult that literally means "pig dog."
20	** When they have dinner with the elderly German couple, the man asks "Maybe they are Hermann's kids with the woman he was married to in Hamburg?" and his wife replies "But he never had kids."
21	* BlatantLies: Russ describes his parents to a girl in Rome as "normal parents."
22	* CallBack:
23	** Clark screams when he sticks his feet in a cold fountain, similarly to how he screamed when he jumped in the cold pool in the original vacation.
24	** He also spends much of the trip wearing a Wally World sweater.
25	* CharacterizationMarchesOn: Rusty and Audrey take on very different personalities than in the first installment. Audrey possesses newfound BigEater tendencies while Russ is obsessed with music, Creator/{{MTV}}, and girls.
26	* ChekhovsGag: The video of Ellen performing "Big Spender" in a ModestyTowel which also includes her and Clark having sex. After a man in France steals Clark's camcorder, later in Italy, the Griswalds later find a billboard of the video ''La Donna nella Doccia'' (Woman In The Shower).
27	* DamselInDistress: Ellen gets drunk in Rome and is kidnapped by a man trying to get a hold of her car keys.
28	* DemotedToExtra: Downplayed; while Rusty and Audrey are in the film just as much as their parents, their depth and personalities from the first film have been whittled down to the point where their personalities can be summed up in three words; Audrey just misses her boyfriend and Rusty has been dumbed down to a generic horny teenaged boy.
29	* DeadpanSnarker: All of the Griswalds have their moments. When Clark tries getting a family picture in Paris, even Rusty's not immune.
30	-->'''Rusty:''' Yeah, the Griswalds in front of a fountain. [[SarcasmMode Major entertainment.]]
31	* DrivesLikeCrazy: Clark puts these skills to use in the climactic ChaseScene in Rome.
32	* GameShow: The Griswalds win their trip to Europe on a game show called "''Pig in a Poke''."
33	* HidingBehindTheLanguageBarrier: The French waiter does this while insulting the Griswolds.
34	* HighSchoolSweethearts: Ellen states verbatim that she and Clark filled this role, and even waited until they planned to get married to have sex.
35	* IgnoreTheFanservice: Ellen shows Clark the sexy outfit she purchased in Paris and pleads that she and Clark spend some alone time in the hotel. Clark, however, is intent on taking her out for a romantic, cultured night on the town.
36	* ImagineSpot: Each of the Griswalds has one during the flight to London.
37	** Ellen dreams about meeting the British Royal Family and Princess Diana getting jealous of her for being with Clark.
38	** Rusty dreams about being a pop star at a club.
39	** Audrey has a nightmare in which she gets fat from European meals.
40	** Clark has a ''Sound of Music''-style dream of his family in the Alps.
41	* InconsistentSpelling: Curiously, this is the only installment in the series to spell the central family's name "Griswald," as the rest of the movies credit the characters as "Griswold."
42	* ItsAlwaysMardiGrasInNewOrleans: Or Oktoberfest in Germany. Note that when the Griswolds escape, the train station says the town is Battenberg, which is in Rhineland-Palatinate. Oktoberfest is a Bavarian festival.
43	* LeftItIn: Before the family leaves for their trip to Europe, Clark videotapes Ellen while she's taking a shower, who then tells him to delete it after he's finished. [[spoiler:The family gets their camera stolen by a thief while they're in France; when they arrive in Rome, Ellen then discovers that Clark did not delete the video of her in the shower at all, when she sees a poster advertising a movie that starred her. Apparently, the thief discovered the video after he stole the camera and advertised it as a movie.]]
44	* MajorInjuryUnderreaction: The man who was riding a bike whom Clark hits with his car is covered with scrapes, but brushes it all off. When he begins spurting blood from his wrists, he states that it's [[Film/MontyPythonAndTheHolyGrail just a flesh wound]]. [[ActorAllusion Oh yeah, and he's played by]] Creator/EricIdle.
45	* MakeoverMontage: The Griswalds go through one in Rome when they go through a bunch of new outfits to try on.
46	* ModestyTowel: Clark records Ellen's dance while she wears nothing but a towel.
47	[[/folder]]
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49	[[folder:N-Z]]
50	* NippleAndDimed: Averted. A waitress at the ''Oktoberfest'' gathering sneaks off with Rusty, and gets her blouse off. [[IdiotHero Clark]] screws things up and the family has to leg it before things progress from there.
51	* NotEvenBotheringWithTheAccent: The Bavarian man, who the Griswalds mistake for their relative, is played by Willy Millowitsch, an iconic folk actor from Cologne. He speaks with his usual strong Colognian accent.
52	* NotSoAboveItAll: Ellen once again tries to play the role of the OnlySaneMan on their family vacation, but after her RageBreakingPoint listed below, she goes back to their hotel to get plastered.
53	* OddballInTheSeries: ''European Vacation'' is the only ''Vacation'' movie not to feature Cousin Eddie and his family.
54	* {{Oktoberfest}}: The Griswalds go to Germany to meet their German relatives, [[spoiler:except they weren't]].
55	* OnlyAFleshWound: Uttered by Creator/EricIdle himself.
56	* PaedoHunt: Seriously, it seems like every waiter they encounter tries to proposition the kids. This isn't EuropeansAreKinky, this is Europeans Are Disgusting Perverted Lowlifes.
57	* PartiallyConcealedLabelGag: Clark takes the family on a side trip from their game show prize vacation to visit their relatives in Germany. They're looking for house six ("6") and it appears they found it and introduce themselves to the couple living there. Just after they step inside, a leaf falls away from the number sign, revealing that it actually says sixteen ("16"). Clark and his family stay with the couple for a night and leave without ever noticing the couple was not their relatives.
58	* PhotoMontage: The ending credits set to Network's "Back in America", showcasing the symbols of 1980's Americana that the Griswalds are returning to after their adventures across the Atlantic.
59	* PoppingButtons: Audrey's ImagineSpot in which she gets fat from European desserts.
60	* PostStressOverEating: After learning she doesn't have to stay thin for Jack anymore, Audrey begins gorging herself at the hotel restaurant.
61	* RageBreakingPoint: Clark lies to Ellen about deleting her ModestyTowel dance on their camera before it was stolen. Eventually, the family comes across a pornographic movie poster obviously referring to the video and featuring Ellen as the star. She is ''not'' amused.
62	* RealAwardFictionalCharacter: The film opens with the Griswalds facing off with a family of geniuses on a game show. The parents are both Nobel Prize winners and the kids are no less brilliant. The Griswalds win anyway... by accident.
63	* RecycledInSpace: The basic theme is the same, a family traveling together and experiencing every possible problem, setback, and trauma.
64	* RediscoveringRootsTrip: Parodied when the Griswolds make a stop to visit their German relatives. They have a wonderful time and feel more connected to their roots than ever... except that the couple they visited weren't actually relatives; Clark found the wrong house.
65	* RentalCarAbuse: When Clark Griswold rents a Citroën DS, he accidentally drives it into a too small gap and it gets stuck.
66	%%* RunningJoke: Or rather bicycling joke.
67	* ShoutOut: The page quote above demonstrates a very blatant one to ''Film/TheSoundOfMusic''.
68	* SickeninglySweethearts:
69	** Audrey and her boyfriend Jack are seen making out for much of Jack's limited screen time. She spends the rest of the vacation pining for him.
70	** The couple who's honeymooning in Europe is also very engrossed in each other. Russ thinks they're about to have sex in public, and upon a second glance Clark tells him it's possible.
71	* SmartPeopleWearGlasses: All four members of the Froegers, the opposing family who have never lost on ''Pig in a Poke'', sport a pair.
72	* TheThemeParkVersion: Everything in Europe is exactly how you'd expect it to be, assuming you're an American who's never been there and who relies solely on NationalStereotypes.
73	* TrainEscape: After causing a riot at Oktoberfest, the Griswolds make a beeline for the train station to get out of Germany.
74	* UglyAmericanStereotype: Father Clark Griswold is TheFool who shepherds his family across a whirlwind tour of Western Europe, mother Ellen tries to be the OnlySaneMan, and the Griswold children are disgusted at being dragged through a continent-sized Weirdoland. This family tends to make themselves ''personae non gratae'' wherever they go, causing mayhem and trouble everywhere with their ignorance.
75	* UndyingLoyalty: Though Rusty [[TookALevelInJerkass is less supportive]] of Clark's endeavors this time around, he ditches a topless blonde to come to his father's aid when Clark is at risk of being hanged. He gripes about it later, of course, but he once again joins his father in the climactic ChaseScene, proving his dedication.
76	* UnluckyExtra: A random English tourist (played by Creator/EricIdle), is always on the receiving end of any kind of accident inflicted upon him by the Griswalds. In fact, he even appears again in ''National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation 2: Cousin Eddie's Island Adventure'', during the airport scene.
77	* VagueAge: Rusty actually averts this trope, stating his age to be fifteen. Audrey is still only implied to be younger until ''[[Film/NationalLampoonsChristmasVacation Christmas Vacation]]'' clearly portrays her as an older sister.
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Context Film / NationalLampoonsEuropeanVacation