Caddyshack (1980)

In writer/director Harold Ramis' feature-film debut - the much-loved, crass sports-golf comedy was set at the elite and snobby Bushwood Country Club (fictitious) in Nebraska; the Warner Bros. "snobs vs. slobs" film was a cult favorite with many quotable lines of dialogue, funny vignettes and clever improvisations. Its tagline was: "SOME PEOPLE JUST DON'T BELONG." On a budget of $6 million, the film made $39.9 million (and ranked #14 for the year). The cult film exploded in popularity with movie buffs and sports fans during the rise of the age of cable and heavy usage of VCRs. The three comedic greats with slightly different styles – Chevy Chase, Rodney Dangerfield and Bill Murray were the key to the film's success.

It was followed by the lesser sequel, director Allan Arkush's Caddyshack II (1988), with only Chevy Chase reprising his role. Budgeted at $20 million, it only made $11.8 million dollars.

The classic sports comedy told about two major threats to an exclusive country club's golf course - a boorish golf-member and property developer, and a destructive gopher.

• during the opening (and closing) credits sequences, a dancing gopher (an animatronic gopher ("varmint") named Chuck E. Rodent) performed to the tune of Kenny Loggins' song: "I'm Alright"; there would be an outright war waged against the 'varmint' by the groundskeeper
• one of the club's teenaged caddies, young, poor working-class underachiever Danny Noonan (Michael O’Keefe) was currently dating the club's snack-bar attendant and waitress Maggie O'Hooligan (Sarah Holcomb); Danny was caddying for New-Age playboyish golfer Ty Webb (Chevy Chase) who was the son of one of Bushwood's stodgy co-founders

Bushwood Country Club Caddy Danny Noonan (Michael O'Keefe)

Danny with Playboyish Golfer Ty Webb (Chevy Chase)

Blindfolded Ty Webb: "Be the ball!"

• when blindfolded and boasting that he had the power of intuition, Ty gave advice to Danny: ("I'm going to give you a little advice. There's a force in the universe that makes things happen. And all you have to do is get in touch with it. Stop thinking, let things happen, and be the ball!"); later, Ty made other Zen-like pronouncements: ("A flute without holes is not a flute. And a donut without a hole is a Danish" or "You're rather attractive for a beautiful girl with a great body")
• the club's elitist, stodgy, snobbish, wealthy and arrogant hotshot Judge Elihu Smails (Ted Knight), the club's other co-founder who directed the caddy college-scholarship program, pulled into the club in his Rolls Royce; he was immediately upset when he viewed a gopher tunneling through the greens of the club's massive golf course

Scottish Greenskeeper Sandy McFiddish (Thomas A. Carlin) - Head of the Dept.

The Club's Greenskeeper Carl Spackler (Bill Murray)

Carl with His Boss Sandy

• the enraged Smalls spoke with the Scottish greenskeeper Sandy McFiddish (Thomas A. Carlin) about the problem; Sandy's lunatic, deranged, and dim-witted greenskeeper Carl Spackler (Bill Murray) was given a misinterpreted request from Smalls to Sandy to destroy an intrusive and pesky gopher who was ruining the golf course: "I want you to kill every gopher on the course" - with Carl's reply: "Check me if I'm wrong Sandy, but if I kill all the golfers, they're gonna lock me up and throw away the key." Sandy clarified: "Gophers, ya great git! Not golfers! The little brown furry rodents!"; for the remainder of the film, Carl became fixated with his task and attempted numerous ways to destroy the pesky rodent
• Judge Elihu Smails was accompanied by his sex-loving, bra-less young blonde niece Lacy Underall (Cindy Morgan), who was judged by one ogling male as "Madonna with meatballs"
• a boorish, crude, abrasive nouveau-riche real estate developer - brash wisecracking, loudmouth Al Czervik (stand-up comedian Rodney Dangerfield in his feature film debut) drove up to the club in his convertible with personalized plates; wearing colorful golf clothing, the disrespectful Czervik immediately began to heckle everyone by spouting many offensive one-liners in the golf shop, with some of the insults directed toward Judge Smails' hat: ("Oh, this is the worst lookin' hat I ever saw. You buy a hat like this, I betcha get a free bowl of soup, huh? (to Smails) Oh, it looks good on you though!")
• shortly later, Czervik continued to harrass and upset Smails' nearby golf group on the green by playing loud music from his golf bag, and hitting Smails in the groin with one of his drives; the aggravating Czervik suggested that the golf course was the perfect place for a condo and shopping mall development; as the Judge's golf game was ending, Czervik bet him $1,000 dollars he couldn't make his final putt; after missing the hole, the frustrated Judge threw his golf club into the air and it struck a woman and rendered her unconscious; to ingratiate himself to the Judge (to help his scholarship chances), Danny took the blame for not putting stick-um on the Judge's golf grips
• in one of the film's most memorable vignettes, the speech-impaired, wacky Carl Spackler recounted, to another incredulous caddy, how he once caddied for the Dalai Lama in Tibet: ("So we finish 18, and he's gonna stiff me. And I say: 'Hey, Lama! Hey, how about a little somethin', you know, for the effort, you know.' And he says: 'Oh, uh, there won't be any money, but when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness.' So I got that goin' for me, which is nice")
• the demented Spackler also became fixated and obsessed with destroying the intrusive gophers; throughout the film, Spackler used various methods to eradicate the gopher pest, including a high-pressure water hose to flood the gopher's holes, as he threatened the 'varmint': ("Scum, slime, menace to the golfing industry! You're a disgrace. You're varmints. You're one of the lowest members of the food chain, and you'll probably be replaced by the rat"); his initial attempt caused the flooding of the entire course

Crazed Groundskeeper Carl Spackler
The 'Varmint'
	Carl Loading His Rifle

• in his quarters, Spackler grabbed his shotgun (with an attached flashlight), as he explained why the Varmint Cong (gophers) had to die: ("License to kill gophers by the government of the United Nations. Man, free to kill gophers at will. To kill, you must know your enemy. In this case, my enemy is a varmint, and a varmint will never quit. Ever! They're like the Viet Cong. Varmint Cong! So what you gotta do, you gotta fall back on superior firepower and superior intelligence. And that's all she wrote"); dressed in camouflage that night, he attempted to shoot the gopher with his rifle - but missed
• Danny learned that the club's caddy college scholarship had become available when the recipient of the award had died from a severe anxiety attack during summer school; his desire to acquire the money meant befriending Judge Smails as the director of the scholarship program; Danny volunteered to caddy for the Judge and expressed an interest in going to college, and added: "It looks like my folks won't have enough money to put me through college"; all of the caddies, including Danny, were immediately impressed by the Judge's sexy young blonde niece Lacy Underall, who was visiting for the summer from Manhattan
• during dinner at the club's restaurant that evening, Czervik continued to make loud and vulgar jokes; after farting, he asked: "Oh, (did) somebody step on a duck?"; he criticized the food: ("I had better food at the ballgame! I tell you, this steak still has marks where the jockey was hitting it"); he also personally insulted the Judge's older, white-haired wife: "Oh, this is your wife, huh? A lovely lady. Hey baby, you're alright. You musta been somethin' before electricity, huh?"; he also continued to harrass and insult other guests at the Judge's table, with lines such as: "The last time I saw a mouth like that, it had a hook in it"; he livened up the music on the dance floor, and then grabbed the Judge's wife to be his dance partner as he sexually grabbed her: "Hey, you wanna make $14 dollars the hard way?"
• after dinner and on an outer balcony with the tempting Lacey, Ty awkwardly and nervously delivered a pick-up line to her: ("What brings you to this nape of the woods, neck of the wape. How come you're here?"); she replied: "Daddy wanted to broaden me"; she coyly invited herself to join him that evening: "I'll bet you've got a lot of nice ties....You want to tie me up with some of your ties, Ty?"; he demonstrated his method of drinking tequilas - by snorting the salt, sucking the lemon and tossing the booze over his shoulder; later, he also attempted to seduce the Judge's promiscuous niece
• Danny competed in the Caddy Day golf tournament to obtain the caddie scholarship - and won; as a result, he was invited by the Judge to attend the Sunday christening of the Judge's sloop at the Rolling Lakes Yacht Club

Busby Berkeley Water Ballet

Floating Baby Ruth Candy Bar: "Doodie!"

Spackler on the Gross Pool Incident: "It's no big deal!"

• a Busby Berkeley-style, synchronized swimming water ballet was performed by the male golf caddies in the country club's pool; during a scatological moment, a floating "Baby Ruth" candy bar (with a modified wrapper: "Baby Rut" and "Baby Runt") was thrown into the pool (a young girl reacted: "Doodie!"); it sent swimmers screaming from the water in a Jaws-inspired panic - shock and fainting was caused when Spackler (after the pool was "scrubbed, sterilized and disinfected") ate the brown object and claimed: ("There it is! It's no big deal!")
• during the Rolling Lakes Yacht Club's christening of the Judge's sloop, Lacey distracted Danny (handsomely dressed in a naval uniform), and enticingly invited him to leave and get high with her back at the Smails' house: ("Hey, Cary Grant. You want to get high?"); after they left, the Judge's boat was christened as "The Flying Wasp," but then Czervik's gigantic "Seafood" Cruiser disrupted the ceremony, collided with the Judge's small sloop, and destructively dropped anchor onto its deck - it quickly sank
• Danny and Lacey were discovered making out in his bedroom by Smails, who then chased Danny (in his underwear) out of the house with a golf club
• in the film's memorable "It's In the Hole!" Cinderella story and golf fantasies, Spackler pretended to be an announcer and player - imagining himself winning the championship Masters golf game at Augusta, while he was actually practicing teeing off by whacking down rows of planted flowers: ("The crowd is standing on its feet here at Augusta, the normally reserved Augusta crowd, going wild, for this young Cinderella. He's come outta nowhere. He's got about 350 yards left. He's gonna hit about a 5-iron, I expect, don't you think? He's got a beautiful backswing -- that's -- oh, he got all of that one! He's gotta be pleased with that. The crowd is just on its feet here. He's the Cinderella boy, uh -- tears in his eyes I guess, as he lines up this last shot, he's got about 195 yards left. And he's got about a -- it looks like he's got about an 8-iron. This crowd has gone deathly silent, the Cinderella story, outta nowhere. A former greenskeeper and now, about to become the Masters champion. It looks like a mirac- it's in the hole! IT'S IN THE HOLE!")
• complications arose the next day when Maggie found Danny sleeping in the caddy shack, and confessed that she was "late" (pregnant), but also added: "I don't hold you responsible! It's my problem. I can handle it"; Danny promised to stand by her: ("I'm not going to let you go through this alone"), although she wanted to keep the baby: ("I'm going to have it! I've already decided!"); when he offered to get married, she declined his offer: ("It might not be yours. Okay?...I'm not making it up"); shortly later, she was happy to report to Danny that she wasn't pregnant after all
• later in Smails' club office, Danny expected to be fired or to have his caddy scholarship revoked for romancing Lacey, but the uptight Smails only asked Danny to keep the incident quiet: ("The last thing any of us needs now is a lot of loose talk about her behavior"), after admitting that Lacey had "a certain zest for living"; the Judge ended their short meeting by asking: "Are you my pal - "Mr. Scholarship Winner'?" - and Danny agreed: "Yes, sir! I'm your pal!"
• a major showdown developed in the film's conclusion when Czervik was denied membership and arrogantly called the club a "dump" and a "crummy snobatorium," but offered to buy it; an 18-hole team golf tournament was organized between two pairs of golfers to settle the matter -- Judge Smails (playing with his regular golfing partner Dr. Beeper (Dan Resin)) and Czervik (playing with Ty Webb); a $20,000 bet (that was eventually increased to $40,000 and then to a double-or-nothing bet up to $160,000) was made on the outcome
• meanwhile, the crazed Spackler threatened the detestable gopher by planting plastic explosives (inside clay squirrels and rabbits) that were to be inserted into the gopher holes: ("I have to laugh, because I've often asked myself. My foe, my enemy, is an animal, and in order to conquer him, I have to think like an animal. And, whenever possible, to look like one. I've gotta get inside this dude's pelt and crawl around for a few days. Who is the gopher's ally? His friend? The harmless squirrel and the friendly rabbit. I'm gonna use you guys to do my dirty work for me")

Spackler Preparing and Planting the Plastic Explosives in Clay Squirrels and Rabbits

• once the tournament commenced, Spackler threatened the animal as he sneakily planted his explosive rabbits and squirrels in the gopher's hole, as he asked his opponent: ("Anybody home? Uh, hello, Mr. Gopher. Yeah, it's me, Mr. Squirrel. Yeah, hi. Uh, just a harmless squirrel, not a plastic explosive or anything, nothing to be worried about. I'm just here to make your last hours on earth as peaceful as possible...In the words of Jean Paul Sartre, 'Au revoir, gopher.' This is gonna be sweet")
• when Czervik faked an arm injury as an excuse for his poor playing, Danny substituted for him (even though he knew it might jeopardize his scholarship, until Czervik offered to compensate him); on his final shot of the game, Danny's putt was perched on the edge of the hole; it was nudged in by a massive, plastic explosives blast set off by Spackler to kill the gopher, and Czervik's team won the game, although the golf course was destroyed in the process

Golf Tournament: Danny's Putt Hanging on the Edge of the Final Hole

Explosions Rock the Entire Golf Course

Curtain-Closing Line: "Hey everybody, we're all gonna get laid!"

• Smails (on the losing team) refused to pay off two of Czervik's enforcers Moose and Rocco who were called upon to make him pay up: ("Help the judge find his checkbook"), and he fled as Czervik delivered a curtain-closing invitation: "Hey everybody, we're all gonna get laid!"; in the midst of everything, the unharmed gopher appeared after having survived the explosions