The defence The Popcorn Loyalist
“It owes the canon nothing.”
The movie pursues immediacy and audience pleasure without begging institutions to certify its worth.
Back to trending 
Summer Rental
Comedy · 1985
Jack Chester, an overworked air traffic controller, takes his family on vacation to the beach. Things immediately start to go wrong for the Chesters, and steadily get worse. Jack ends up in a feud with a local yachtsman, and has to race him to regain his pride and family's respect.
Movie details
Summer Rental
“Life is a beach.”
1985 Comedy 1h 27m
Critical arithmetic
The consensus, allegedly.
Scores change. Arguments endure.
IMDb
6.3 / 10
18.8K votes
Rotten Tomatoes
19 %
Tomatometer
Metacritic
38 / 100
Metascore
TMDB
6.1 / 10
Community rating
External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.
Jack Chester, an overworked air traffic controller, takes his family on vacation to the beach. Things immediately start to go wrong for the Chesters, and steadily get worse. Jack ends up in a feud with a local yachtsman, and has to race him to regain his pride and family's respect.
CriticWise case file
What this film says about your taste.
Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.
The archetype split
Who fights over Summer Rental?
For the defence
The Popcorn Loyalist
“Big screen, big feelings, no apologies.”
Read their case For the prosecution
The Big-Idea Head
“You watch with your brain, not your gut.”
Read their objectionThe split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.
Taste neighbourhood
Nearby on the taste map.
TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.
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Names above the title
The people responsible.
Cast & crew
Directed by
Carl Reiner
Written by
Mark Reisman · Jeremy Stevens
John Candy
Jack Chester
Richard Crenna
Al Pellet
Rip Torn
Scully
Karen Austin
Sandy Chester
Kerri Green
Jennifer Chester
John Larroquette
Don Moore
Joey Lawrence
Bobby Chester
Court is in session
Put Summer Rental on trial.
Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.
The prosecution The Big-Idea Head
“Easy pleasure, short half-life.”
It moves efficiently through the moment but offers little reason to keep arguing once the credits end.