National Lampoon's Animal House is a 1978 American comedy film directed by John Landis and written by Harold Ramis, Douglas Kenney and Chris Miller. It stars John Belushi, Tim Matheson, John Vernon, Verna Bloom, Thomas Hulce and Donald Sutherland. The film is about a trouble-making fraternity whose members challenge the authority of Dean Vernon Wormer of the fictional Faber College.
Produced by Matty Simmons of National Lampoon and Ivan Reitman for Universal Pictures, it was inspired by stories written by Miller and published in National Lampoon, which were based on Ramis's experience in the Zeta Beta Tau fraternity at Washington University in St. Louis, Miller's Alpha Delta Phi experiences at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire and producer Reitman's at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
Of the younger lead actors, only the 28-year-old Belushi was an established star but even he had not yet appeared in a film, having gained fame as an original cast member of Saturday Night Live, which was in its third season in the autumn of 1977. Several of the actors cast as college students, including Thomas Hulce, Karen Allen and Kevin Bacon, were just beginning their film careers. Matheson, also cast as student Eric "Otter" Stratton, was already a seasoned actor, having appeared in movies and television since the age of 13.
Filming took place at the University of Oregon from October to December 1977. Following its initial release on July 28, 1978, Animal House received generally mixed reviews from critics, but Time and Roger Ebert proclaimed it one of the year's best. Filmed for only $3 million, it garnered an estimated gross of more than $141 million in the form of theatrical rentals and home video, not including merchandising, making it the highest-grossing comedy film of its time.
The film, along with 1977's The Kentucky Fried Movie, also directed by Landis, was largely responsible for defining and launching the gross-out film genre, which became one of Hollywood's staples. Animal House is now regarded as one of the best comedy films of all time.
In 2001, the United States Library of Congress deemed National Lampoon's Animal House "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry. It was No. 1 on Bravo's "100 Funniest Movies". It was No. 36 on AFI's "100 Years... 100 Laughs" list of the 100 best American comedies. In 2008, Empire magazine selected it as No. 279 of "The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time".
Plot In the fall of 1962, Faber College freshmen Lawrence "Larry" Kroger and Kent Dorfman are seeking to join a fraternity. Finding themselves unwelcome at the exclusive Omega Theta Pi house party, the two visit the derelict Delta Tau Chi house next door. Kent believes that Delta will have to accept him as a "legacy" since his older brother, Fred, was a member. They meet John ("Bluto") Blutarsky, chapter president Robert ("Hoov") Hoover, charismatic ladies' man Eric ("Otter") Stratton, motorcyclist Daniel Simpson ("D-Day") Day, suave-yet-troublesome Donald ("Boon") Schoenstein and Boon's exasperated girlfriend Katy. Larry and Kent are accepted as Delta pledges and given the fraternity names "Pinto" and "Flounder", respectively. Meanwhile, Omega pledge Chip Diller is accepted into the fraternity and given a paddling as part of his initiation.
The Delta house is on probation due to regular shenanigans and overall poor academic scores. Wishing to remove the unruly fraternity from Faber's campus, Dean Vernon Wormer elevates the Deltas to "double secret probation" and directs Greg Marmalard, the Omega house president, to get fellow Omega and ROTC Cadet Commander Douglas C. Neidermeyer to find a clause to revoke Delta's charter. Various misadventures increase the rivalry between Delta, Omega, and Wormer, including the accidental death of Neidermeyer's horse during a retaliatory prank following the ridicule Flounder received from Neidermeyer. Unbeknownst to Marmalard, Otter has had an affair with Marmalard's girlfriend, Mandy Pepperidge, a member of the Alpha Delta Pi sorority.
Bluto and D-Day steal the answers to an upcoming midterm exam, unaware the Omegas switched it for a fake. The Deltas all fail and their lowered grade-point averages prompt Wormer to announce he needs only one more misdemeanor to revoke their charter and permanently expel them. Meanwhile, Mayor Carmine DePasto demands that Dean Wormer and the University pay money in order to use the main street in town for their upcoming College parade.
Undeterred by Wormer's threats, the Deltas organize a toga party and recruit Pinto and Flounder to shoplift from a supermarket as a fraternity prank. At the market, Pinto meets a young cashier named Clorette, the daughter of Mayor DePasto, unbeknownst to Larry, and invites her to the party, while Otter flirts with an older woman, who turns out to be Dean Wormer's alcoholic wife Marion. During the toga party, at which Otis Day and the Knights perform, Otter seduces Marion, while Pinto and Clorette make out until she passes out, drunk. Pinto resists the temptation to "take advantage" of her while she is unconscious and instead delivers her home in a shopping cart. He later discovers that she is only 13 years old.
Wormer organizes a kangaroo court led by the Omegas, which revokes the Deltas' charter and confiscates the contents of their house. Otter, Boon, Pinto, and Flounder take a road trip in a Lincoln Continental Flounder has borrowed from Fred. After reading about the recent death of a student at a nearby all-female college, Otter poses as her fiancé in order to find dates for himself and the others. The ruse works and the Deltas, along with their dates, stop at a club where Otis Day and the Knights are performing, unaware that the clientele is exclusively African-American. As Boon and his date, Shelly were hitting it off, some of the patrons intimidate the other Deltas into abandoning their dates and fleeing the club, damaging both Fred's car and several others in the parking lot.
The next morning, Boon discovers Katy has spent the night with English professor Dave Jennings. Babs Jansen, herself in love with Marmalard, informs him that Mandy and Otter have been having an affair; Marmalard has Babs lure Otter to a motel where he, Niedermeyers, and some other Omega boys ambush and assault him. Due to the Deltas' low midterm grades, Wormer expels them all from Faber and gleefully tells them he has notified their local draft boards that they are now all eligible for military service.
The Deltas initially concede defeat until Bluto rallies the fraternity to seek revenge during the annual Homecoming parade. D-Day converts the heavily damaged Lincoln into an armored vehicle, which the Deltas conceal inside a cake-shaped breakaway parade float. The Deltas wreak havoc during the parade and crash into the reviewing stand, toppling the Wormers and DePasto while also causing damage to DePasto's car dealership. As Hoover asks the Dean for another chance, an epilogue amidst the chaos reveals the fates of the characters:
Hoover became a public defender in Baltimore, Maryland. Pinto became an editor for National Lampoon. Marmalard became a Richard Nixon White House aide and was raped in prison in 1974. Otter became a gynecologist in Beverly Hills, California. Neidermeyer was killed by his own troops during the Vietnam War. Flounder became a sensitivity trainer at Encounter Groups of Cleveland, Inc. D-Day's whereabouts are unknown. Boon and Katy married in 1964 and divorced in 1969. Babs became a tour guide at Universal Studios, Hollywood. Bluto became a United States Senator and married Mandy.
Cast Delta Tau Chi House John Belushi as John Blutarsky ("Bluto"), an uncouth, heavy-drinking student Tim Matheson as Eric Stratton ("Otter"), the house's lothario Thomas Hulce as Lawrence "Larry" Kroger ("Pinto"), a freshman who joins Delta House alongside Flounder Peter Riegert as Donald Schoenstein ("Boon"), Otter's best friend Stephen Furst as Kent Dorfman ("Flounder"), Pinto's best friend and fellow freshman whose older brother Fred was a member of the Delta fraternity Bruce McGill as Daniel Simpson Day ("D-Day"), a chopper-riding biker student Karen Allen as Katy, Boon's girlfriend James Widdoes as Robert Hoover ("Hoov"), the amiable chapter president of Delta House Douglas Kenney as Dwayne Storkman ("Stork") Christian Miller as Curtis Wayne Fuller ("Hardbar")
Omega Theta Pi House James Daughton as Gregory Marmalard, the Omega chapter president, whom Wormer directs to sabotage Delta House Mark Metcalf as Douglas C. Neidermeyer, a pompous and mean-spirited ROTC Cadet Commander Kevin Bacon as Chip Diller, a freshman who is readily accepted into Omega
Pi House Mary Louise Weller as Mandy Pepperidge, Marmalard's original girlfriend and Bluto's love interest Martha Smith as Barbara Sue "Babs" Jansen, Mandy's fellow Pi house member who also likes Marmalard
Others John Vernon as Dean Vernon Wormer, the authoritarian head of Faber College Verna Bloom as Mrs. Marion Wormer, the dean's alcoholic wife Donald Sutherland as Dave Jennings, a pot-smoking English professor Cesare Danova as Carmine DePasto, the crooked mayor of the unnamed city where Faber is located, who has implicit ties to the local mafia Sarah Holcomb as Clorette DePasto, the mayor's 13-year-old daughter Lisa Baur as Shelly Dubinsky, Otter's date from Emily Dickinson college and Fawn's roommate. DeWayne Jessie as Otis Day, the lead singer of Otis Day and the Knights Robert Cray uncredited bassist for Otis Day and the Knights
Production Development Animal House was the first film produced by National Lampoon, the most popular humor magazine on college campuses in the mid-1970s. The periodical specialized in satirizing politics and popular culture. Many of the magazine's writers were recent college graduates, hence its appeal to students all over the country. Doug Kenney was a Lampoon writer and the magazine's first editor-in-chief. He was graduated from Harvard University in 1969 and had a college experience closer to the Omegas in the film, having been president of the university's elite Spee Club. Kenney was responsible for the first appearances of three characters that appeared in the film: Larry Kroger, Mandy Pepperidge and Vernon Wormer. They made their debut in 1973's National Lampoon's High School Yearbook, a satire of a Middle America 1964 high school yearbook. Kroger's and Pepperidge's characters in the yearbook were effectively the same as their characters in the movie, whereas Wormer was a P.E. and civics teacher as well as an athletic coach in the yearbook.