Director Report Card: John Landis (1978)

3. Animal House

A group of iconic comedic sensibilities combined to make “Animal House.” National Lampoon was a comedy magazine, popular on college campuses as it was largely written by recent graduates. Such as Doug Kenney and Chris Miller, whose stories of exaggerated fraternity mayhem were especially popular. Among the fans was Ivan Reitman, then primarily a producer of Canadian exploitation films. Teaming with the writers, he would create a comedy stage show with notable names like John Belushi and Harold Ramis in the cast. Much of the National Lampoon cast would move to New York and become part of “Saturday Night Live.” At that point, Reitman and Ramis conspired to make a National Lampoon movie. After Ramis and Kenney's initial treatment – about Charles Manson in high school – was rejected, the duo took inspiration from Miller's college stories. Reitman wanted to direct the film but only had “Cannibal Girls” to his name at the time. Producers decided on John Landis, after seeing “The Kentucky Fried Movie.” All the players in place, “Animal House” would take shape.

In 1963, college freshman Larry Kroger and Kent Dorfman step onto the Faber University campus. The two hope to join a fraternity but are quickly rejected by the elitist Omega Theta Pi. Instead, they find themselves at Delta House, a riotous and chaotic frat loathed by the college's dean, Vernon Wormer. Larry and Dorfman are accepted by the hard-partying Deltas, with nicknames like Bluto, Otter, and D-Day. The fraternity members seek out more booze and partying, soon getting themselves in more trouble with the Dean. This also causes the fierce rivalry between Delta House and the Omegas to increases in intensity, leading to an inevitable showdown.

The popularity and success of “Animal House” would practically birth a new subgenre of American comedy movies. The “slobs vs. snobs” comedy would see other groups of slackers, misfits, and screwballs outsmarting stuck-up jerks and pretentious snobs, usually with outrageous pranks and while partaking in copious bad behavior. This genre remains popular even into the modern day. “Animal House” being the progenitor of a hundred other “slobs vs. snobs” comedies is easy to understand, when you see what a prototypical example of the subgenre the film is. The Delta House boys devote their whole lives to having a good time and trying to get laid – goals most young people can relate to – while Omega House wish to enforce their restrictive rules on the whole campus. The Delta House guys are rebels. The Omega gang are such born followers, they willingly march into a blind alley later in the film. Everyone sees themselves as the underdog, the peppy misfits fighting against a restrictive system, and comedies like this play off of that.

What really makes “Animal House's” "slobs vs. snobs" mentality so appealing is John Landis' anti-authoritarian inclinations. That trend, evident in his first two features, continues to evolve here. The entire institute of college is mocked early on, as Faber's motto is simply “Knowledge is Good,” as generic a statement as possible. In “Animal House,” the voices of authority are corrupt assholes. Dean Wormer is a cartoonish bully, whose main goal in life seems to be preventing the Delta House frat from partying. Of course, he conspires with the Omega fraternity. Members of that frat dress in military uniforms, bully the Delta House gang, and enthusiastically participates in homoerotic hazing rituals. (That last one is an example of “Animal House's” not-great social politics, which we'll I'll talk about more later.) Later, Landis aligns the Omega frat with cultural acts of villainy like the Nixon administration and the Vietnam war. “Animal House's” snobs aren't just snobby but representative of a specific breed of real life asshole.

Here's something that I didn't understand about “Animal House” for years and I was able to enjoy the movie a lot more once I got it. A lot of real life college frat-bros apparently saw this movie as something to aspire to, if the popularity of toga parties and that John Belushi poster is any indication. Yet “Animal House” is not meant to be a model of actual fraternity behavior. It's obviously a grotesque, cartoonish exaggeration of real college life. The guys in “Animal House” are seen attending classes two times, I think. The deans wield a level of power equivalent to a police chief.  The characters' daily consumption of alcohol would kill any normal person. The movie understands this. It has scenes of characters being flatten like a pancake or angels and devils popping up on shoulders. Real life people using Delta House as a model for their fraternity is equivalent to a veterinarian scientifically studying a “Tom and Jerry” cartoon.

Another part of “Animal House's” iconic standing in pop culture has, I think, betrayed it. It's one of the most popular American comedies of all time and, for many years, frequently topped list of All-Time Funniest Comedies. In fact, “Animal House' is not a gut-busting, laugh-a-minute gag-fest. The film's best joke involves a horse suddenly dropping dead and the direct way a janitor uses to get rid of it. Most of its humor come from tossed-off one-liners and the absolute conviction with which the cast attacks the material. The movie's biggest gags, like the float-filled chaos of the finale, are among its more tedious moments. In truth, “Animal House” is a shaggy hang-out movie. It has almost no plot and is largely devoted to its character just goofin' off and doing stuff. While it certainly has laughs, it's far too loosely assembled to be the “Funniest Movie Ever.” It's merely an amusing collection of ridiculous moments.

Despite the Delta House Boys' status as antiheroes to slacking college students everywhere, the question must be asked: Are we even suppose to like these guys? “Animal House” is all too aware that its heroes are buffoonish idiots and abusive assholes. The most beloved characters, Bluto and D-Day, are less people and more forces of destruction. Dorfman is the most awkward of nerds while Larry is practically a non-entity. The rest of the gang are preoccupied with drinking and fucking, in sometimes morally dubious ways. The only reason we're able to root for these guys at all is because the Omega Theta Phi guys are even bigger assholes. “Animal House” is, intentionally I think, a story of one breed of cartoonish asshole fighting another type of cartoonish asshole. We're suppose to laugh at the ridiculousness of that, not look up to them.

Or maybe I'm giving the film too much credit. Watching “Animal House” in 2020, when we are far more aware of the culture of sexual abuse on college campuses, is a far different experience than how it must've played in 1978. This movie's attitude towards women is, uh, not great. Bluto looks up cheerleaders' skirts. He props a ladder outside a sorority window, somehow going unnoticed by the naked women inside. A moment has one of our heroes outright debating with himself over whether to perform sexual assault or not, on a drunken date. (He ultimately decides not to rape, so that's something, I guess?) I don't think John Landis and the rest of his team set out to make an anti-woman movie with lax attitudes toward sexual responsibility. They were just overgrown boys who wanted to see as many titties as possible. But the film probably – definitely never would have but probably – should have been more critical of its desire to exploit and ogle female bodies. If nothing else, it's marginally less misogynistic than the imitators that would follow, the likes of “Porky's” and “Revenge of the Nerds.”

It's not just the movie's sexual politics that are intensely dated today. “Animal House” has also been widely accused of frat-bro casual racism. After their rousing performance during the toga parties, several of the Delta House Boys pull into a bar to see an encore performance of Otis Day and the Knights. The bar is, in fact, populated exclusively by black people, who aren't very welcoming to a bunch of random white kids dropping in. Okay, yeah, this scene is probably pretty racist. But I think it's honestly a little less offensive than it initially seems. Throughout the scene, the joke is on the white people. Like dumb-asses, they bungled into this space where they don't belong. The black populace of the bar do not have the patience for their white nonsense and let that be known. It's another example of the film telling us its heroes are morons and the audience, weirdly, thinking we're suppose to agree with them.

It almost definitely isn't but the film's deeply outdated sexual and racial politics may even be intentional. “Animal House” is set in 1963. The soundtrack is filled out with doo-whop and golden oldies rock. The fashion, especially the beanies and pillbox hats, further root the movie in this time period. There's a reason “Animal House” is beloved by so many old white dads. It is intentionally designed to appeal to boomer nostalgia. Perhaps the film's content was simply reflecting the antiquated attitudes of the time it portrays. “Animal House,” in some ways, plays like the perverted id to “American Graffiti's” more civilized ego. Then again, the writers intentionally set the movie days before the Kennedy assassination, in the last days of supposed American innocence. So, I don't know.

Ultimately, “Animal House” is most amusing when it lets its cast do their thing. John Belushi, simply put, was a naturally gifted comedic performer. He had a wild physicality that was rare, the ability to generate a laugh with simply a glance. A moment where he tries to get a laugh out of a depressed frat buddy by smashing beer bottles or cans against his head is hilarious. The often referenced moment, where he smashes a guitar, is an act of unleashed animal intensity. Much of Belushi's dialogue and bits – like Bluto taking a ton of food from the cafeteria – was improvised. Because John Landis knew when to let a force of nature like Belushi do his thing. Belushi's unmatched comedic timing and acute understanding of how to get a laugh is “Animal House's” best quality.

Belushi is so titanic that he overshadows pretty much every performer in the film. Yet there are other funny actors in “Animal House.” Donald Sutherland – who was, if you can believe it, the marquee name in this movie – is hilarious as the literature professor who shows no enthusiasm for his students. His stoned-out dialogue is probably the only realistic touch in the film. Many of the actors are exactly on the movie's ridiculous level of unreality. Such as John Vernon, perfectly pitched as a voice of tyrannical authority as Dean Wormer. Or Mark Metcalf as one of the biggest assholes in college movie history. I think the intention to have Tim Matheson and Karen Allen underplay it, in comparison to the surreal characters around them, was probably an intentional move to invite the viewer in the film's exaggerated world.

Ultimately, watching “Animal House” in the modern day often feels like a schizophrenic experience. The boomers loved it. My dad loves it too. Most millennials watch it and see everything that was wrong with the entitled, sexist, racist prior generations. I don't think the zoomers are even aware of the film, an example of how quickly it has faded from its once vaulted place of relevance. Yet “Animal House” is still pretty funny in spots and, I think, is smarter about its offensive qualities than some people give it credit for. If nothing else, John Landis sure knew how to get the best performances out his funny cast or how to stage an energetic dance number. “Animal House” must be watched as the cultural artifact it is but still has some level of value. [Grade: B]