Meatballs (film)

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Meatballs

Directed by	Ivan Reitman
Produced by	John Dunning Daniel Goldberg André Link Lawrence Nesis
Written by	Len Blum Daniel Goldberg Janis Allen Harold Ramis
Starring	Bill Murray Harvey Atkin Kate Lynch Russ Banham
Music by	Elmer Bernstein
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date(s)	June 29, 1979
Running time	99 min.
Language	English
Budget	$1,600,000
IMDb profile

Meatballs is a 1979 Canadian comedy film. It was the first film appearance of Bill Murray and, though not his first film, launched Ivan Reitman into a career of light comedies. It introduced child-actor Chris Makepeace in the role of Rudy Gerner. It was considered somewhat raunchy in its day. It was followed by several sequels, including Meatballs 2.

1 Plot summary
2 Filming locations
3 Music
4 Sequels
5 Trivia
6 DVD
7 External link

[edit] Plot summary

The film followed the antics and foibles of head counselor Tripper Harrison (Murray) and the counselors-in-training (CITs) at Camp North Star, a cut-rate summer camp somewhere in the "North Woods". The characters range from reasonably sane, to zany, to screwball.

The main part of the plot involves the rivalry with Camp Mohawk, another summer camp across the lake – one with a richer clientele – and Camp Northstar's attempt to come away with, if not outright victory, then at least its very own perverse version of pride, from the yearly "Olympiad" held between Camp Northstar and Camp Mohawk.

[edit] Filming locations

The film was made at Camp White Pine, and other locations in and around Haliburton, Ontario, Canada, and features a number of Canadian personalities, notably the aforesaid Chris Makepeace, and also Harvey Atkin as the long-suffering Morty, who is always the butt of some rather unkind practical jokes, made possible by his tendency to sleep very deeply.

[edit] Music

The original music was written by Elmer Bernstein, and musicians contributing to the soundtrack included Mary MacGregor, who performed "Good Friend", David Naughton, performing "Makin' It", and Rick Dees and His Cast of Idiots, who performed the title theme. The former two songs made the Billboard pop charts. Session musicians on the theme included Ed Green on drums and Ron Cook on electric guitar.

[edit] Sequels

[edit] Trivia

One character in the film, a stereotypical nerd character named "Spaz", struck a chord with viewers, though not always in a positive way. The character wore a broken pair of eyeglasses, fastened together at the bridge with a white piece of tape. In a number of schools there were reports of eyeglass-wearing children being taunted with the name "Spaz".

During the filming of the movie, Camp White Pine continued business as usual, resulting in many campers and staff members being used as extras and secondary characters in the film.

In the DVD release of the film, all of the music remains intact save for the title track, which seems to have been slightly re-dubbed by Bill Murray and the pace changed to a faster tempo.

[edit] DVD

The film was first released on DVD in 1999 by HBO. Sony Pictures has since acquired the rights and will issue a special-edition DVD (with an anamorphic transfer, a director's commentary, and a "Making of" featurette) on June 5, 2007.