HOW I SPENT MY SUMMER VACATION is a more entertaining film than it has a right to be. It sees Mel Gibson playing another half-crazed criminal type who winds up in a sprawling Mexican prison that looks more like a shanty town than the usual hellhole. This is a prison where kids and women live in peace alongside the convicts and where all manner of backstabbing (literal and metaphorical) goes on on a regular basis.
The plot is lightweight and packed with humour, most of it deriving from Gibson's undeniable grizzled charm. Basically it's a film where he starts with nothing and has to rise to the top by outwitting all the various factions and villains pitted against him. The film's heart is the relationship between Gibson's character and a streetwise kid, played by the very good Kevin Hernandez. This central relationship helps to ground and humanise what would otherwise have been a very superficial and rather unappealing movie.
Still, this is well made and fast-paced, although it's not quite the action movie they'd have you believe. Gibson is excellent, as is always the case, and the inventive narrative barely gives you time to draw breath before skipping to another situation. It's goofy but has undeniable charm at the same time.
The plot is lightweight and packed with humour, most of it deriving from Gibson's undeniable grizzled charm. Basically it's a film where he starts with nothing and has to rise to the top by outwitting all the various factions and villains pitted against him. The film's heart is the relationship between Gibson's character and a streetwise kid, played by the very good Kevin Hernandez. This central relationship helps to ground and humanise what would otherwise have been a very superficial and rather unappealing movie.
Still, this is well made and fast-paced, although it's not quite the action movie they'd have you believe. Gibson is excellent, as is always the case, and the inventive narrative barely gives you time to draw breath before skipping to another situation. It's goofy but has undeniable charm at the same time.