Ralphie is nine, lives in Hohman, Indiana, and has one goal for Christmas: an official Red Ryder carbine-action two-hundred-shot range model air rifle. His mother says no. His teacher says no. The department store Santa says no and pushes him down the slide with his boot. A Christmas Story made no money in 1983 and is now shown for twenty-four hours straight on American television every Christmas.
What Happens In The Parker House
The Old Man wins a major award, a lamp shaped like a woman’s leg in a fishnet stocking, and puts it in the front window. Flick gets his tongue stuck to a frozen flagpole on a triple-dog dare. Ralphie says the word, the F-dash-dash-dash word, and has his mouth washed out with Lifebuoy. He beats up Scut Farkus, the bully with yellow eyes. The Bumpus hounds eat the turkey, and Christmas dinner is at a Chinese restaurant with the waiters singing Deck the Halls. And he gets the gun.
Why It Became The American Christmas Film
Jean Shepherd, who wrote the stories it is based on, narrates as the adult Ralphie, and the narration is the film. Darren McGavin’s Old Man, swearing at the furnace, is one of the great film fathers. The house in Cleveland is a museum. Peter Billingsley is now a producer who has worked on Iron Man and Elf.
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