Director John Landis put himself on the map with this low-budget, fabulously successful comedy, which made a then-astounding 62 million dollars and started a slew of careers for its cast in the process. National Lampoons Animal House (referred to by most people as Animal House) is set in 1962 on the campus of Faber College in Faber, PA. The first glimpse we get of the campus is the statue of its founder Emil Faber, on the base of which is inscribed the motto, Knowledge Is Good. Incoming freshmen Tom Hulce and Stephen Furst find themselves rejected by the pretentious Omega fraternity, and instead pledge to Delta House. The Deltas are a motley fraternity of rejects and maladjusted undergraduates (some approaching their late twenties) whose main goal -- seemingly accomplished in part by their mere presence on campus -- is disrupting the staid, peaceful, rigidly orthodox, and totally hypocritical social order of the school, as represented by the Omegas and the colleges dean, Vernon Wormer (John Vernon). Dean Wormer decides that this is the year hes going to get the Deltas expelled and their chapter decertified; he places the fraternity on double secret probation and, with help from Omega president Greg Marmalard (James Daughton) and hard-nosed member Doug Neidermeyer (Mark Metcalf), starts looking for any pretext on which to bring the members of the Delta fraternity up on charges. The Deltas, oblivious to the danger theyre in, are having a great time, steeped in irreverence, mild debauchery, and occasional drunkenness, led by seniors Otter (Tim Matheson), Hoover (James Widdoes), D-Day (Bruce McGill), Boon (Peter Riegert), and pledge master John Bluto Blutarsky (John Belushi). Theyre given enough rope to hang themselves, but even then manage to get into comical misadventures on a road trip (where they arrange an assignation with a group of young ladies from Emily Dickinson University). Finally, they are thrown out of school, and, as a result, stripped of their student deferments (and, thus, eligible for the draft). They decide to commit one last, utterly senseless (and screamingly funny) slapstick act of rebellion, making a shambles of the towns Founders Day parade, and, in the process, getting revenge on the dean, the Omegas, and everyone else whose ever gone against them.

Not everything in Animal House works, and the racial implication of the scene in the Dexter Lake Club (specifically, the notion that a group of white visitors who stumble innocently into a black roadhouse would be in incredible danger) seems disturbing -- assuming one takes any of this seriously at all -- but, overall, it was one of the funnier movies of the 1970s, and the first big studio comedy (albeit not one that the studio expected too much of or invested very much in) aimed specifically at collegiate and teenage audiences. Thus, it started a cycle of movies that encompassed everything from Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982) and Revenge of the Nerds (1984) to Legally Blonde (2001) and Slackers (2002). Animal House was also among the first feature films not built around a musical subject to garner some of its appeal by loading its soundtrack up with period hits, all played just prominently enough in the background and woven well enough into the action to attract the notice of audiences without distracting them -- and then it made a small fortune for the record division of its studio by selling the soundtrack album. In that sense, it followed the lead of George Lucas American Graffiti (also a Universal release) and did it one better, limiting itself to a single discs worth of songs. Central to most audiences enjoyment, however, was John Belushis performance as Bluto, the fraternitys most dedicated drinker and most enthusiastic member, seven years an undergraduate and with no prospects of completing a degree. His ability to chug fifths of Jack Daniels in one draught is merely the highlight of a uniquely gonzo performance that even teetotalers had to enjoy. The presence of Karen Allen as the most fetching screen ingénue (though hardly an innocent, as we discover) since Julie Harris in East of Eden was also a notable introduction, though James Widdoes, Peter Riegert, Bruce McGill, Tim Matheson, the ubiquitous Kevin Bacon (in a small role here), and even DeWayne Jessie (who played singer/bandleader Otis Day, and was still performing to collegiate audiences in that guise in the 1990s) have also enjoyed long careers as actors, directors, writers, and so forth. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide