Seen

A few days ago, I finally saw the comedy classic "Caddyshack" as part of an initiative by a few friends and myself to finally knock off the various classics that we all have neglected over the years. I never had felt much eagerness for this one, but I always understood how good it was supposed to be, and whether it was good or not, I wanted to have made the effort to find out. Here was a golden opportunity to overcome my lack of motivation.

It was, I must say, a disappointment. I didn't find much of the film to be very funny, which is a problem for a comedy. There were one or two chuckles, but that was the extent of it. It was helped none by a poorly organized script. There were a couple of promising story elements one could have built around, such as the caddy competition or the plans of Rodney Dangerfield's character to buy the golf course, but those things were squandered.


It's too bad, because there are some fine people in the cast. Dangerfield is reasonable as a rich, obnoxious big shot, although he's never been an absolute favorite of mine. Bill Murray is good as an oddball groundskeeper. Chevy Chase can be good, and here is fair playing what strikes me as a role not unlike Peter Graves' in "Airplane". Some of the young members of the cast also do well enough. They just amount to sparks which have nothing to land on and ignite.

Still, the movie did a little for me. I was critical of the script, but there is also something in movie that play out in unconventional fashion. A disciplined three act structure as Syd Field conceived it is the most dependable thing, but movies that don't adhere to it can work, and this movie even had some of that. In the chaotic world of caddies there was room for episodic zaniness, but it somehow didn't come together. Anyway, I did manage to scratch a film they call a classic off my list.