All American families on vacation was a comedy genre in the late 50s and early 60s - movies like Holiday for Lovers, Mr Hobbs Takes a Vacation and this one. It's Disney's entry into the genre, with Fred MacMurray and Jane Wyman as a couple who head to Europe with their kids, Deborah Walley, Tommy Kirk and Kevin Corcoran.
It's a breezy, fun film, clearly made by people who've been on family vacation. It benefits from some universal conflicts - there's a bit of marital strain because Wyman comes from a posh Boston family and MacMurray is a plumber, MacMurray tries to connect with his kids and often makes a hash of it, his teenage kids don't want to hang out with him but young Corcoran does, Corcoran wants to take a piss on a tour of underground tunnels.
There's some unpleasant-to-modern-viewers stuff with MacMurray lording it over Wyman (depicting MacMurray as an idiot tempers this a little but only a little), Deborah Walley (the daughter) tries to get love interest Michael Callan to have a normal career.
Also there's a very effective scene where Walley's love interest, Michael Callan, confronts her at the beach where she's been flirting with other guys - he grabs her, and she gets away, terrified, and MacMurray hugs her - this is very believable and well done. Then of course Callan and Walley get together and we're meant to feel happy about it because he's learnt his lesson. But the thing is he's jealous and possessive and that's not going to change - MacMurray gets jealous over a man paying interest to Wyman, and I think we're meant to find that's cute, only now you also wonder if the husbands aren't punching the wives. Callan in particular plays his character like a wife beater - he was a good looking guy, Callan, who could act, and dance, but his performances often had a strand of cruelty about them, he looked like a villain, and I really didn't want him and Walley to wind up together.
Walley is sweet and an ideal all American girl - she's got some nicely written scenes, professing her lack of interest in Callan while clearly being into him. Tommy Kirk is perfect as the son, constantly trying to pick up women (wearing a beret, pretending to be impostors,etc) - his scenes are more broad but he plays them well. Wyman doesn't have that much to do but still has more to do than in Holiday for Lovers where she played a similar sort of role.
I did feel the movie would have played better with Brian Keith as the lead than MacMurray - more forceful, more like James Stewart. I never bought MacMurray as a plumber. I guess he's okay.
I think however it was a good idea to shoot most of the film from his point of view so he watches his kids do their romancing from a distance and isn't entirely sure what's going on. That's quite effective.
And location filming on the boat and in Europe helps.
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