The Great Outdoors (1988)
The Great Outdoors was the link movie connecting The Blues Brothers and Warlock: The Armageddon.
Linked through John Candy and Chris Young.
Both John Candy and Chris Young appeared in The Great Outdoors.
About The Great Outdoors
"This is no holiday… this is war!"
It's vacation time for outdoorsy Chicago man Chet Ripley, along with his wife, Connie, and their two kids, Buck and Ben. But a serene weekend of fishing at a Wisconsin lakeside cabin gets crashed by Connie's obnoxious brother-in-law, Roman Craig, his wife, Kate, and the couple's two daughters. As the excursion wears on, the Ripleys find themselves at odds with the stuffy Craig family.
Directed by Howard Deutch
Written by John Hughes
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Behind the camera
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Soundtrack
Score by Thomas Newman
The film's end-credits sequence features the cast dancing to Wilson Pickett's 'Land of a Thousand Dances', a moment critics such as Kevin Thomas singled out as the only genuine fun and energy in the movie.
Movie trivia
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1
Annette Bening makes her film debut in a supporting role as Kate Craig.
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2
Before The Great Outdoors reached theaters, Dan Aykroyd, John Candy and Chris Young briefly played their film roles during the end credits of She's Having a Baby.
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3
Principal photography took place in Bass Lake, California, over three weeks in October 1987, standing in for the fictional Lake Potowotominimac.
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4
Ducey's Bass Lake Lodge was used as 'Wally and Juanita's Perk's Pine Lodge Resort', and the Loon's Nest cabin was constructed on Universal's backlot to match Ducey's cabins.
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5
The movie was shot under the working title 'Big Country' but the name was changed to avoid confusion with the similarly timed film Big.
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6
John Hughes's original script climax involved a mechanical giant fish towing the twins; when the fish prop failed, the screenplay was rewritten to center on the bald-headed bear chase.
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