too much. there is too much greatness in this movie. it doesn't start or stop with Bill. there are just too many fantastic moments, swings, trick shots, plots, subplots, hilarious lines, and great actors in Caddyshack to love it biasly. Chevy Chase? Rodney Dangerfield? amazing. but i like to think that it is Bill, who plays Karl, the assistant groundskeeper (put in charge of killing the gopher that's digging up the green) that is the glue that holds all the greatness of this film together. i NEED the three of them together in this to love it - like a strange happy threesome.
Caddyshack is probably one of the few of my favourite Bill movies where i don't fantasize about him sexually. the opening Bill scene should explain why - he is GROSS and definitely kind of crooked-pervy. and i LIKE crooked pervy! but this is too crooked. like, he's drool-jerking-in-the-bushes pervy. when it looks like he's rubbing one off at the sight of the middle-aged female golfers, dirty-talking to them through the side of his mouth? amazing. Karl is always sweaty, and always (fittingly) really dirty. and despite working for a posh club, he SO doesn't care. it's SO great that he's SO odd. i want him in this no other way. when i watch Karl, i can't help but wonder (apart from golf) what is his turn on? is it really the middle-aged-sun-visor-wearing-female-wide-ass golfers? because you never see him checking out the young women on the course... i'd like to think that he likes them only old, dry, and wrinkled - makes him grosser. perfecter. there are too many fantastic scenes with Bill in this movie, but one of my very very favourites is when he's telling the story of once being a caddy for the Dalai Lama: "Twelfth son of the Lama. The flowing robes, the grace, bald... striking. So, I'm on the first tee with him. I give him the driver. He hauls off and whacks one - big hitter, the Lama - long, into a ten-thousand foot crevasse, right at the base of this glacier. Do you know what the Lama says? Gunga galunga... gunga, gunga-lagunga. So we finish the eighteenth and he's gonna stiff me. And I say, 'Hey, Lama, hey, how about a little something, you know, for the effort, you know.' And he says, 'Oh, uh, there won't be any money, but when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness.' So I got that goin' for me, which is nice..."
the LAMA. please. it's f-cking classic. and probably one of Bill's most famous movie quotes ever. and when Karl's practicing his "Cinderella Story" swing on the flowers? (btw, if you're a golf or Bill Murray fan, and haven't yet read Bill Murray's book, "Cinderella Story: My Life in Golf" - you're missing out.) or when he's making the clay explosives in the shape of cute little rodents and the gopher is watching him through the window, totally creeped out? SO FUNNY. and then how he bites off and spits out the head off one of the squirrel shaped explosives (as if it were a grenade) before dropping it down a gopher hole... and a shout out to that death-repellent gopher! while it IS Bill's foe, c'mon. the thing dances. and when it's suspiciously looking at the squirrel-shaped explosive shoved down a gopher hole, and it taps it with it's little paw? it's ridiculously cute. but back to Bill... that one perfect scene with him and Chevy - when Karl gives him "a Bob Marley sized joint" and tells Ty to "cannonball it" down with what looks like moonshine? am i the only one that thinks there needed to be more movies with Bill and Chevy? this could still happen, but i'm afraid it won't.
Chevy. let's talk about Chevy, yes? because we cannot talk about Cadyshack without talking about Chevy. Chevy really delivers as Ty, the playboy son of one of the Bushwood Country Club's co-founders. how is Ty so f-cking cool? i'll tell you how... Ty is a smooth (albeit slightly clumsy) operator with a bit of a sh-t eating face. does that make sense? i love him. the scenes where he plays the organ while taking tequila shots (creatively - by snorting the salt and throwing the tequila over his shoulder) is hilarious. and when he sings to that lucky slut Lacey, "I was born to love you. I was born to lick your face. I was born to rub you. But you were born to rub me first." (btw, i had an ex-boyfriend who would constantly sing this to me - few ex-memories can still make me smile...) Ty doesn't give a shit. he's rich, and doesn't really know why. he pisses on the green, and golfs barefoot in an almost zen-like state - "na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na." and he refills Perrier bottles and fakes the fizz by shaking them up. his doorbell is a GONG. and when Ty speaks, his words are few - the guy doesn't ramble. his sentences are short, succinct, one-liners, which are PERFECTLY delivered with the best Chevy Chase sh-t eating smirk. everything out of Ty's mouth is a f-cking t-shirt - especially his random words of wisdom to his caddy Danny, whom he calls Timmy (and Betty): “There’s a force in the Universe that makes things happen. And all you have to do is get in touch with it, stop thinking, let things happen and be the ball. [...] Just be the ball, be the ball, be the ball. You’re not being the ball Danny." /// "A flute with no holes is not a flute. And a doughnut with no hole is a Danish." /// "Nobody likes a tattle-tale, Danny. Except me." pardon me, but without Chevy Chase, Caddyshack would be nothing.
even Danny (Michael O'Keefe) is awesome as a caddy (and a really good golfer) trying to raise money for his college fund. he decides to caddy for the Judge Smails (btw, also one of the country club's co-founders) in hopes of buttering him up to win the Caddy College Scholarship. i love watching Danny suck up. he tries everything. i also like that Danny is this unlikely heartthrob (do people still say heartthrob?) well, Danny sort of is... he first beds that Irish lassie Maggie, and then that lucky slut Lacey (only to be caught in the (almost) act by her uncle, Judge Smails. BUSTED BIG TIME! great scene when Danny is hiding from Smails in the bathroom, and Smails' wife (who is taking a shower) asks Danny to loofah her back - his smile is so uncomfortably kind.
Mr. Rodney Dangerfield.
Mr. Rodney Dangerfield is H.I.L.A.R.I.O.U.S in this movie as the real estate tycoon Al Czervik. it's his pants. the way he dances. the way he smiles. the way his eyes buldge. how he celebrates a good swing. how he can't stand still. his farts! the way he consistently mocks that a-hole Judge Smails. how after dropping the anchor of his boat into Smails' boat, sinking it, Al yells at Smails for scratching HIS anchor? and. the. insults... oh lord. what can we say here? the one liners - classic Dangerfield (NB: read the following lines with Dangerfield's voice in your head): "Oh, this your wife, huh? A lovely lady. Hey baby, you must've been something before electricity. " /// "You're a lot of woman, you know that? Yeah, wanna make 14 dollars ...the hard way?" /// "He called me a baboon - he thinks I'm his wife." and i'm sorry - but i'm not sure if a better closing line to a movie exists... if there is one, i have yet to find it: "Hey everybody, we're all gonna get laid!" it's just too much greatness. man, this movie really makes me miss him. pardon me, but without Mr. Rodney Dangerfield, Caddyshack would REALLY be nothing.
and i don't think this movie could have cast a better a-hole villain for Judge Smails than Ted Knight. god he's so great in this. when he keeps nonchalantly kicking the golf ball out of the trees to get a clear shot? what an amazing cheat. how when he ask's Danny what he's doing Saturday, and you think he's about to invite him to be a guest at his yacht party, but instead asks him to mow his lawn? SNORT. he too has some pretty fantastic lines: "I've sentenced boys younger than you to the gas chamber. Didn't want to do it... I felt I owed it to them." i'm sorry, but his anger is number one.
when was the last time you watched this movie? if you said "never" - that is SO the wrong answer. watch this movie please... your soul will thank you for it. and when you do, please email me your favourite line and let's laugh - i bet you a Titleist that you'll come up with a new favourite line every 2 minutes...
"In the immortal words of Jean Paul Sartre, 'Au revoir, gopher'." Karl Spackler (Bill Murray) in Caddyshack
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