How I Spent My Summer Vacation

Mel Gibson’s colourful (ahem) personal life means that he’s box office poison to most studios these days so from now on expect him to be popping up in fare such as this, i.e. relatively smallish budget films that only secure a minimal release, before disappearing from sight probably never to be heard of again. However, if you do manage to catch How I Spent My Summer Vacation (or Get the Gringo in North America – more on that later) you’ll be in for a pleasant surprise as, though this isn’t anything world beating, it is a short sharp film with some punchy dialogue and even punchier violence. Written by Gibson and director Adrian Grunberg the film stars Gibson as “The Gringo”, a US citizen who finds himself in a Mexican prison, who befriends a young boy who is being kept in the prison in order to have his kidney “stolen” by a crime boss. Gibson thrives in roles such as this (i.e. a good man with rough edges or vice versa) and turns in the required performance here. Most crucial of all though is that, even though this is full of silly stereotypes it’s still told in such a way that you do actually feel something for the characters so hats off to Gibson and Grunberg for that. Talking of Grunberg, he’s been an AD and the like on many films now going back over the last 15 years or so, including on a couple of previous Gibson pictures, which probably explains how this has come to be his debut feature. He does inject the film though with a touch of visual flare and handles the action scenes well including the opening of the film which is as thrilling as it is funny. The screenplay does go a bit all over the place at times though, including a bizarre scene involving a fake meeting with Clint Eastwood and the overall set up of the prison and why it exists is taken too long to address. As mentioned above Gibson’s reputation now goes so far ahead of him that this didn’t even get a cinema release in the US (though it did appear via the Video On Demand service as Gibson claimed this will be the way future films will eventually be released. You’re not fooling anyone there I’m afraid Gibbo). Oddly enough though the film was first released in Israel, which is the type of real life irony that even the movies can’t match.

The OC Film Sting Final Verdict
If you can put your personal feelings about the man aside, this is one of Gibson’s best performances for a while and Grunberg could be one to watch in the future. Rating: 7/10.