The Movie:

"Holy crap, Wayne Newton's hittin' on mom!"

This is by far my favorite movie about Las Vegas, and in my opinion, it is the truest depiction of the kinds of people that actually go to vegas. This movie is absolutely hilarious with the Griswolds getting into all kinds of crazy adventures in Las Vegas.

The whole "Mr. Papagiorgio" thing is so inconceivable, but anyone would want to be Rusty Griswold. And speaking of "inconceivable", Wallace Shawn is does a great job playing the most annoying blackjack dealer you've ever seen. It's such a memorable performance that on multiple occasions in my experience at real blackjack tables in Las Vegas, the entire table erupted in laughter in just recalling the movie. And Wayne Newton! The situations in this movie are so absurd, and yet so great. I love this movie!

Oh and who can forget that "alternate casino" (filmed at The Klondike) with games like "rock paper scissors" and "pick a number between 1 and 10"!

The only thing about this movie that I don't like is the whole Hoover Dam segment. Not only is it really lame and unfunny, it's just so incongruous with rest of the movie! It's almost as if it was tacked on there just to make the movie long enough.

But if you are at all a fan of the city of Las Vegas, you must see this movie. I guarantee you will love it!

The DVD: My biggest pet peeve about this disc is that it is not widescreen. In fact, there has never been a widescreen version of this movie ever released on DVD! That being said, the video transfer, though slightly grainy and not the sharpest I've seen, is clean, with no dust or scratches. I'd probably give it a "3" if it was anamorphic widescreen. The audio, though technically 5.1 encoded, is pretty much completely centered in the front speakers. You'd think that in the casino scenes you'd get some slot machine sounds coming out of the surround channels, but you'll get nothing of the sort.

Special features are mostly of the text type. The "gallery" contains behind the scenes text and photos, cast profiles, and a theatrical trailer.