As for gifts this holiday season I’ve been inspired by film critic David Edelstein’s recent segment from CBS News’ Sunday Morning, the title “Good Things Come in Small, Round Discs,” to think outside the box (office) as he says when it comes to giving DVDs to friends and loved ones. I couldn’t agree more. It’s a great idea and it shouldn’t just be this year but on all special occasions. Who cares about Transformers and Harry Potter when you can give someone a quirky little indie film like Permanent Vacation featuring the late great David Carradine.

Carradine, who passed away earlier this year is one of the darlings of independent cinema. His list on IMDB is 257 films and TV episodes deep and would have kept growing had the Grasshopper not choked to death from supposed self-inflicted asphyxiation. This film isn’t one of his best, he sort of only has a cameo in it but it’s actually a side of David Carradine we haven’t seen before. As he says in the DVD extras, this is the first time he has played an “old man.” It’s the DVD extras that we’re really talking about here. It’s a Carradine gem, like a baseball signed by Pee Wee Reese or a twenty-five cent stamp, a Susan B. Anthony coin, a can of NEW Coke…there’s something rarely seen here resonating Carradine’s days as Woody Guthrie in Bound For Glory (1976) that would be enjoyed by all David Carradine fans. And the behind the scenes insight make it a perfect gift for the student filmmaker or for filmmaker wannabes, or for the fan of dark comedies, British humor, quirky characters, campy films, or just camping in general. The director W. Scott Peake and the actors give a kind of run-down on the whole production and the fun they had while filming in and around Milton, Florida. The size alone of lovebugs seen flying around during takes might suggest it’s a Jurassic Park sequel. The camera really does add fifteen pounds because these things are monstrous, Kafkaesque, I’d say. To the DVD extras, then, I’d say the movie Permanent Vacation becomes the bonus material.

It’s the story of Eric Bury played by Frank Harper (Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998), Bend It Like Beckham (2002)) whose employer forces him to take a vacation (we should all be so lucky) due to his exhausting workload. I felt exhausted just looking at him, even his walk is exhausting. Eric and his family embark on a camping trip to Florida where Eric’s mandated holiday is consumed with concern for his kids – the daughter who is a religious zealot, the son who reverts to some sort of primordial state once in the “wilds” of their campsite – and Eric’s wife who is possessed with thoughts of sex acts with dwarves. He seeks the friendship and advice of an old camper played by Carradine, but like Cinderella Eric is brought back to pumpkin reality by the madness of other campers, and particularly his family.

Permanent Vacation is based on the novel “What We Did On Our Holidays” by author Geoff Nicholson who has written travel articles for The New York Times and claims to write about obsessions, which you can most certainly see here. You get the sense too that director Peake rarely veered from the novel. Actually, Geoff Nicholson nods to that fact on the DVD while clueing us in on the autobiographical nature of the story. We also have 80’s TV and film veteran Michael Bowen (Valley Girl (1983), Magnolia (1999), Kill Bill 1 (2001), Walking Tall (2003) and too many other great films like Less Than Zero (1987) to mention, not to mention TV episodes of Lost), who has a sizeable role as a idiotic cop, or someone with a gun pretending to be a cop who torments the vacationing Eric until Eric literally spills his tea. Peake should make a sequel to Permanent Vacation solely about Bowen’s character. Bowen, born in the 50’s, has the energy of a teenage boy. I love this dude’s intensity and I enjoyed hearing how he showed up at the director’s office in Los Angeles after a long trek on his motorcycle. Turns out he’s related to David Carradine and suggested Carradine to the director.

Permanent Vacation reminded me a little of Local Hero (1983) and a French film Confessions d'un Barjo (1992) adapted from the Philip Dick novel Confessions of a Crap Artist. Movies filled with peculiar, idiosyncratic characters that are walking social media without the media – communities of “friends” that don’t really know one another but collectively comprise an alternate universe of customs that like any town or environment set a norm for tourists to adapt to. Which Eric eventually does. It’s not the best movie in the world, could be tightened up, could have used a little more exposition with Eric in further defining his character but like I said the movie is really the bonus material. The extras are the A feature. I simply envy Peake because he and cinematographer George Reasner had one of the last few chances to work alongside this great American actor.

See the official David Carradine website , or visit author Geoff Nicholson’s site. Available through Amazon, Netflix and Blockbuster, and at the Permanent Vacation website

“Choosing DVDs should be a test of imagination - and nerve. You have to be ready for the recipient to say, ‘What the heck is this?’ Then you say, ‘Free your mind.’” – David Edelstein.

See Edelstein’s article.