Caddyshack (1980)

My Review

“Caddyshack” is a sports comedy film set at the golf course of an exclusive country club where a teenage caddy is caught between a feud between a straight-laced judge and a brash nouveau riche real estate developer. First-time director Harold Ramis created a comedy which seems chaotic due to poor direction and style of comedy, which lurches from sitcom tame to madcap farce skits. It has poor production values and terrible writing by Brian Doyle-Murray, Douglas Kenney, and Ramis. It is also turns into low-brow comedy due to heavy use of bathroom humor and sexual innuendo.

The performances are at least acceptable, including Chevy Chase and Rodney Dangerfield as anti-establishment characters, Ted Knight as the judge who is one of the founders of the country club, Michael O’Keefe as the caddy, Bill Murray as the greenskeeper, Sarah Holcomb as a waitress, Cindy Morgan as the judge’s niece, Albert Salmi as the caddy’s father, Lois Kibbee as the judge’s wife, and Henry Wilcoxon as the Episcopal bishop. This was Wilcoxon’s second to last role in a movie career that began in 1931.

The unwatchable “Caddyshack” was a big hit at the box office for Orion Pictures and Warner Bros. Pictures. It was filmed in various locations around Florida. A sequel was release in 1988 called “Caddyshack II” starring Chase and a host of other stars not in the original.