But one man did remember his Christmas youth. Author Jean Shepherd turned his memories of his family and town during Christmas into a book called In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash. Almost Norman Rockwell like, Shepherd's stories are slices of Christmas Americana. His recollections are funny but not farfetched. They're grounded in truth. We all see bits of ourselves and our parents and siblings in Shepherd's tales. Director Bob Clark would turn Shepherd's book into a holiday movie that has now become a yuletide classic called A CHRISTMAS STORY (1983). Clark would not seem like the obvious choice to make A CHRISTMAS STORY. His previous film PORKY'S (1981) was one of the early gross out comedies following in the footsteps of ANIMAL HOUSE (1978). Yet Clark made the jump from raunchy comedy to family Christmas comedy with considerable ease.
I kept hearing about A CHRISTMAS STORY from friends during college and beyond but never found the urge to find it on television. If it wasn't IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946), I wasn't going to watch it. But then TBS decided to show a twenty four hour marathon of A CHRISTMAS STORY one December. How could I resist? I didn't have to try and figure out what time it would be on. It was going to be on over and over again. The marathon is where I became bewitched by the little film that is A CHRISTMAS STORY.
One misconception I had about A CHRISTMAS STORY is that both the author and the director were Canadian and the story took place in Canada. Boy was I wrong. Both Bob Clark and Jean Shepherd are as American as can be and A CHRISTMAS STORY although set in the northeast was actually filmed in Cleveland, Ohio (with a few parts shot in Toronto, Canada). Where I got the idea that this great American holiday film was really Canadian, I'll never know. I might blame it on too much maple syrup and Labatt's beer. The CHRISTMAS STORY screenplay is by Bob Clark, Jean Shepherd, and Leigh Brown based on Shepherd's book and short stories.
Set in Shepherd's hometown of Hammond, Indiana in the early 1940s, A CHRISTMAS STORY is a series of holiday vignettes set around young Ralphie Parker (Peter Billingsley) and his quest to receive a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas. Ralphie's Mother (Melinda Dillon) won't hear of buying Ralphie the BB gun. "You'll shoot your eye out," is her motherly advice and warning. Ralphie schemes alternative ways to own that rifle. He writes a theme paper about the Red Ryder BB gun assigned by his teacher Miss Shields (Tedde Moore) hoping to win her over. Miss Shields gives him a C on the paper. When Ralphie and his younger brother Randy (Ian Petrella) visit Santa Claus (Jeff Gillen) at Goldblatt's Department Store, Ralphie forgets to ask Santa for the BB gun before he's pushed down a curvy slide by a disingenuous elf. It seems like Ralphie's Christmas wish will fall on deaf ears.
It's a busy, hectic time in Ralphie's young life over the holidays. When he and his brother Randy and best friend Flick (Scott Schwartz) aren't avoiding the neighborhood bullies Scut Farkus (Zack Ward) and his pint sized partner Grover Dill (Yano Anaya) or a pack of dogs that roam the streets, Ralphie is the older sibling in the Parker household dominated by his eccentric father known as the Old Man (Darren McGavin). The Old Man is never happy or satisfied with anything whether it's fixing the furnace or putting up the Christmas tree. The Old Man is thrilled however when he wins a prize from a local newspaper contest. It's a sexy burlesque leg lamp which he proudly displays in his living room window much to the distress of Ma Parker.
Christmas night. The boys race to bed as the Old Man and Ma Parker put out the Christmas presents before retiring to bed. Christmas morning arrives. Ralphie and Randy open their presents as the parents watch. Ralphie receives a hideous pink bunny suit from his Aunt Clara that Ma Parker forces him to try on. Randy rips open all his presents gleefully. It seems all the presents have been opened. No Red Ryder BB gun. But there's one present left, nearly forgotten, stuffed next to a desk behind the tree. It's for Ralphie and it comes from an unexpected source. Could it be the Red Ryder BB gun? I dare anyone to watch the end of A CHRISTMAS STORY without a tear in your eye or a chuckle rolling around in your throat.
A CHRISTMAS STORY never veers into too much chaotic mirth like CHRISTMAS VACATION (1989) or JINGLE ALL THE WAY (1996). Director Clark sets up several key plot points throughout the film and rewards us with the pay off near the film's end. The pack of dogs. The Red Ryder BB gun. The mantra "You'll shoot your eye out!" It all comes together perfectly. A CHRISTMAS STORY also has just wonderful oddball holiday moments. Christmas dinner at a Chinese restaurant. Sticking your tongue on a frozen flag pole. Ma Parker bundling up Randy in so many jackets that he looks like the Michellin Man. The Old Man's obsession with the leg lamp. The Parker's are a dysfunctional family but they're a family. That's the point. Families are all dysfunctional in some way but that's what makes being a family unique.
Much of the humor that I like in A CHRISTMAS STORY at just little off the cuff jokes and references. Nothing over the top. Bits like Ralphie attending Warren G. Harding School. The Parker family singing Christmas songs off key. The coonskin cap that red headed bully Scut Farkus wears. The Chinese restaurant waiters who can't sing 'Fa La La La La' instead singing 'Fra La La La La.' The less than jolly Santa and his grumpy elves at the shopping center. One of the key elements to A CHRISTMAS STORY'S success is the narration by author and co-screenwriter Jean Shepherd. His tone and delivery matched with the actions on the screen are perfect. You feel like you are inside the adolescent head of Ralphie Parker, Shepherd's alter ego in the film.
Sometimes the success of a film is because there are no big stars in the film. Just actors playing their parts to perfection like the actors in A CHRISTMAS STORY. The Old Man seems like it was meant for Darren McGavin. I had already loved McGavin as the crotchety newspaper reporter Carl Kolchak chasing supernatural stories in my favorite television show of the 70s KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER (1974-75). But McGavin tempers the Old Man's gruffness with specks of humanity and humor. He loves his wife and sons. He's just not good at showing it. The burden of life and working grinds him down during the day. Only as the film progresses does the Old Man's soft side start to peek out. Melinda Dillon as Ma Parker was a popular actress in the late 70s and early 80s. Pretty but not striking, Dillon looks like a 1940s actress. She had played a mother in Steven Spielberg's CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (1977). In A CHRISTMAS STORY, she has slightly older boys to take care of in Ralphie and Randy. Ma Parker is the engine that runs the Parker family. They're not rich but she treats her children like royalty (unless they swear. Then, she'll wash their mouths out with soap but feel guilty afterward).
The real star of A CHRISTMAS STORY is Peter Billingsley who plays Ralphie. With his pink cheeks, snow white hair, and black rimmed glasses, Billingsley steals the movie by just playing Ralphie like he is - a kid enamored by Christmas and all its trimmings. Everything that Ralphie experiences during A CHRISTMAS STORY we have all experienced at one time or another. Waiting in long lines for Santa Claus at the shopping mall. Dealing with bullies. Trying to figure out if our parents are angels or lunatics. The agony and ecstasy of opening presents on Christmas morning. Billingsley captures it all with his naturalistic acting. A CHRISTMAS STORY would be Billingsley's most well know film. He would continue making a few more movies and appearing on television like THE WONDER YEARS during his youth. As an adult, Billingsley is now a producer with Jon Favreau's IRON MAN (2008) among his credits.
Director Clark has a knack for casting unique kids for A CHRISTMAS STORY. Besides picking Billingsley as Ralphie, Clark's other excellent kid casting choices are Zack Ward and Yano Anaya as the neighborhood bullies Scut Farkus and Grover Dill. Ward sneers and looks like a wolf from a Tex Avery cartoon. Yano is the typical short kid with an attitude. The kids all look like they could be from a Norman Rockwell painting which might have been Clark's goal. The film takes place in the early 1940s when Rockwell's art work for The Saturday Evening Post was at its most popular.
What's most appealing about A CHRISTMAS STORY is that it's a small film that has touched and tickled audiences all over. If you ask most adults my age (around fifty) or older, they will tell you their favorite Christmas movies are from the 40s and 50s like IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE or MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET. It's hard to find a more modern holiday film that is both well done and entertaining. Jon Favreau's ELF (2003) or Robert Zemeckis's THE POLAR EXPRESS (2004) are two that come to mind. But A CHRISTMAS STORY is both. Made in the early 80s but set in the early 40s, the film captures a Christmas as seen through the eyes of a precocious, imaginative young boy. It's never crass or gross. A CHRISTMAS STORY is the best holiday gift to watch this or any holiday season.
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