Paul McGuire Grimes from Paul’s Trip to the Movies chat with Dana Barron, who played Audrey in National Lampoon’s Vacation. Plus he gives us his review on Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny out in theaters.

The next movie in Paul’s movie series at Emagine Theaters Eagan is the Hollywood classic “Sunset Boulevard” on July 23rd. Click here for tickets on sale now.

NATIONAL LAMPOON’S VACATION (40^th Anniversary)

Clark Griswold is a family man in hopes of spending more time with his wife, Ellen, daughter Audrey, and son Rusty. He gets the wild idea to travel cross country from Chicago to California to visit the renowned amusement park Walley World. Like most family vacations, their road trip doesn’t quite go to plan as there are countless mishaps, shenanigans, and oddball relatives that get in their way.

-Starring: Chevy Chase, Beverly D’Angelo, Dana Barron, Anthony Michael Hall, John Candy, Randy Quaid, Imogene Coca

-Directed by Harold Ramis and written by John Hughes, both of whom left an iconic stamp on 1980s comedies

-Vacation set the standard for road trip comedies with an edge. It may be about a family, but the R-rating was earned at the time.

-The film launched four sequels European Vacation (1985), Christmas Vacation (1989), Vegas Vacation (1997) and a reboot Vacation (2015)

-The humor and family themes are timeless. Anyone can relate to THE Griswolds and the legendary road trip they went on.

INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY (in theaters)

Harrison Ford has played many iconic roles in his career. He dons the hat and whip for one final time as famed archaeologist Indiana Jones in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. Director James Mangold takes over for Steven Spielberg for the franchise’s fifth entry. He opens the film with a lengthy prologue taking Indy back to fighting with the Nazis. They’re trying to get their hands on the Holy Lance that was used to draw Christ’s blood and a legendary artifact believed to be Archimedes’ dial. Decades pass and we catch up with Indy in 1969 getting ready to retire from teaching. People in the streets are celebrating the moon landing and protesting the Vietnam war. He should know that it won’t be easy to retire as his goddaughter Helena shows up unannounced looking for the dial that her father (spent decades researching. The dial has been broken into two pieces and if put back together has dangerous consequences on the fate of the world. She’s not the only one out for the dial as Mads Mikkelson’s character, Jürgen Voller will stop at nothing to reclaim what he believes to be his artifact.

-Starring: Harrison Ford, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Mads Mikkelson, Toby Jones, Boyd Holbrook, Antonio Banderas, and John Rhys-Davies is back again as Sallah.

–Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny is hoping to conclude the Indiana Jones franchise in a strong way after the fourth entry 2008s Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull left audiences a little sour.

-There’s no denying the power Harrison Ford as had over audiences as this character dating back to 1981s Raiders of the Lost Ark. He inhabits the role again as if not type has passed slipping into Indy’s grumpy ways with perfect wise crackin’ line readings.

-Phoebe Waller-Bridge is terrific casting as Helena who offers a frenemy-style relationship next to Indy as she has her own motives and plans with the dial. Their banter works well as they desperately try to keep the dial out of the hands of Jürgen Voller.

-Director James Mangold has the daunting task of making an Indiana Jones film feel like a Steven Spielberg film while adding his own artistic style and viewpoint to it. You can’t help but think of Spielberg’s films while watching this new one, and then, you’re a bit disappointed realizing only Spielberg can do Spielberg.

–Dial of Destiny is missing that visual eye has Spielberg storyboarded and created some iconic images that are forever associated with the character, and Mangold can’t quite get there its shot using too many close ups and an overabundance on CGI to pull this off.

-Doesn’t capture that epic scale or the exotic locations that this globe trotting adventure is known for. There’s something about filming a movie set in 1969 with 2022 technology that doesn’t look right when you think back to the practical sets, models, and effects the original trilogy had back in the 1980s.

-There are some surprises along the way. Seeing Harrison Ford back as Indiana Jones with the hat and whip and hearing the iconic John Williams score play out is worth the price of admission. This is supposedly Williams final film score.

RATING: 3 out of 5 TICKET STUBS

A Celebration of the Indiana Jones Franchise

Harrison Ford has been wowing audiences as the famed archeologist Indiana Jones since Raiders of the Lost Ark in 1981. Since then there have been five films total in the franchise, and its launched a television series with The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles and multiplecomics, novels, theme park attraction and video games featuring the character.

–Star Wars creator George Lucas came up with the idea of the character in the early 1970s wanting to make a movie fashioned after the old serial movies featuring heroes like Zorro and Buck Rogers. He would pitch the idea around to different friends and filmmakers like Steven Spielberg who was coming off working on Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Spielberg wanted to make a James Bond style film, which was perfect for the Indiana Jones character George Lucas had in mind. For there, the creative juices were flowing as a screenwriter was hired who penned Raiders of the Lost Ark, which featured Indiana Jones chasing after the lost Ark of the Covenant.

Indiana Jones film franchise

• Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
• Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984)
• Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)
• Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008)
• Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023)

-Raiders of the Lost Ark was nominated for 9 Oscars, winning 4. Was nominated for Best Picture and Best Director.

–Raiders of the Lost Ark appears on the American Film Institutes Top 100 Greatest Films of All Time list. #60 on the original list and then moved down to #66 on the Tenth Anniversary list

-the first four films are now streaming on Paramount+ and perfect for a weekend movie marathon

-Tom Selleck was originally cast as the title role, but couldn’t get out of his contract for shooting Magnum P.I.