Tourist Trap (TV)

Take Chevy Chase's screwball Vacation movies, plug in Daniel Stern and Julie Hagerty as the parents of two can't-be-bothered kids coerced into holing up in an RV with their well-intentioned dud of a dad and mild-mannered mom for three weeks, and file down the funny parts just enough so no one gets offended, and what you get is Tourist Trap, a likable movie with heart and a message. George Piper (Daniel Stern) is a disgruntled Wisconsin banker and Civil War buff who dreams of tracing the glory-lined path of his great-great-grandfather, the Union hero Jeremiah Piper. Fed up with his fractured home life and unwilling to wait any longer, he packs up his family and the bumbling begins. A fence and a streetlight crumble as he commandeers the RV down his suburban street, and on the highway, two thugs on motorcycles misinterpret the pointy-finger part of "Where Is Thumbkin," a game he's playing to entertain his thoroughly unimpressed family. George's good-guy stripes shine through, though, when the Pipers' picked-up travel companion, a rugged Renaissance man of a doctor with two dreamy kids, shows his true colors on a hiking trip--Mr. L.L. Bean turns out to be a bullying control freak. For all its predictability and tidiness, getting snared into the Tourist Trap feels comfortable; this modern-day Cleaver family's exploits are easy to swallow. Kids 8 and older will giggle over the mindless gags and parent-directed wisecracks. --Tammy La Gorce (from amazon.com)