A Christmas Story has become one of the most ubiquitous Christmas movies out there, yet there are many layers of background and trivia that most viewers will never know. The film is over four decades old now, and it will be playing in homes all around the world this month — especially those tuned to TNT or TBS for the 24-hour marathon. For those that want to dive a bit deeper into Ralphie’s story, read on.
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A Christmas Story premiered on November 18, 1983, and was an instant critical and commercial success. Directed and co-written by Bob Clark, it starred Peter Billingsley as Ralphie Parker, Darren McGavin as his father “The Old Man,” Melinda Dillon as his mother Mrs. Parker, and Ian Petrella as his brother Randy. The movie depicts a nostalgic Christmas spirit through a series of vignettes set at Ralphie’s school, among his friends, and at home. It was set in the year 1940 somewhere near Lake Michigan, and Ralphie was meant to be 9 years old. An older version of Ralphie narrates the entire movie in voice-over.
Source Material
First things first: A Christmas Story is actually adapted from the book In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash by Jean Shepherd. Shepherd was well-known as a radio personality, often narrating nostalgic tales of childhood on the air. After much encouragement, he began writing those stories down and editing them for publication in magazines. In 1966, he published them all in one big collection. Although it is often described as a memoir, Shepherd said the book was a healthy mix of fact and fiction.
Shepherd was not just the author — he was the voice of older Ralphie narrating the entire movie. He also made a cameo appearance standing in line to see Santa Claus a Higbee’s. When the movie came out, adult viewers might have recognized Shepherd’s voice from the radio, but as time has gone on, the movie has developed a life of its own and this set-up has been buried in history.
In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash contains 31 stories, but only four of them were used as the basis for A Christmas Story. Others were later adapted into the 1994 movie My Summer Story. Meanwhile, other writers helped to expand the “Parker Family Saga” in six other movies.
Unifying Themes and Meaning
A Christmas Story is pretty meandering and light-hearted, but there is definitely some strong storytelling going on to bring the whole movie together in the end. The strongest throughline of the movie is Ralphie’s obsession with getting a Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-shot Range Model BB gun — and most adults’ warnings that he shouldn’t have it. His mother, his teacher, and even the department store’s Santa all warn him, “You’ll shoot your eye out,” and in the end, he nearly does just that.
Ralphie gets the BB gun as a Christmas gift from his father and runs right outside to use it. However, one of the beads quickly ricochets back and knocks his glasses off, injuring him in the process. Ralphie claims that he was hurt by a falling icicle, but his mother seems to know what really happened.
This conclusion manages to dovetail a few elements of the story nicely. For one thing, Ralphie is often scared of his father and doesn’t seem to think they have much in common, yet The Old Man is the one who got him the Christmas gift he really wanted. Meanwhile, he’s frustrated by the nagging warnings about how dangerous the gun is, yet his mother turns out to be very patient and kind when he does hurt himself.
It’s also worth noting that this is a humbling experience for Ralphie — he has become jaded by predictable experiences such as the decoder ring, but this injury reminds him he has a lot to learn. In the end, when the narrator remarks that this was the best Christmas gift he would ever get, it’s another way of saying he will never be able to recapture this youthful spirit.
Side Plots
Of course, a movie juggling this many plots has a lot of other things to say as well. A lot of the vignettes focus on the intimate realities of humoring loved ones around the holidays — from Ralphie’s reviled pink-footed pajamas to The Old Man’s furious battles with the furnace. In many ways, this inspired the commentary that would follow as the family Christmas movie genre developed over the years.
This includes the recurring bit about The Old Man being chased by the Bumpus family’s dogs. In the end, the animals trash the Parker family’s kitchen and destroy their turkey dinner, leaving them no choice but to go out to a Chinese food restaurant for the holiday. This one major subversion of expectations has really set the scene for other family movies to come since, reminding viewers that the important thing is to spend time together, not adhere strictly to traditions.
Finally, the movie does a lot to depict the small steps Ralphie is taking towards growing up, even in the few weeks covered by this movie. From the iconic lamp to his experimentations with swearing and even fighting off bullies, we can see Ralphie losing his innocence and starting the long road to adulthood. Ralphie seems ominously aware of this as well, while the narrator makes it clear that he treasures the memories of those simpler days.
Parker Family Saga
A Christmas Story wasn’t the first film adaptation of Shepherd’s writing, and it certainly wasn’t the last. It was preceded by the 1976 made-for-TV movie The Phantom of the Open Hearth, as well as the 1982 made-for-TV movie The Great American Fourth of July and Other Disasters. While A Christmas Story was a theatrical hit, that team followed it up with two more TV movies — The Star-Crossed Romance of Josephine Cosnowski (1985) and Ollie Hopnoodle’s Haven of Bliss (1988). All four of these TV movies were written by Shepherd himself, and they are difficult to track down today.
As mentioned above, another adaptation was released in 1994 titled It Runs in the Family: My Summer Story. This movie recasts the Parker family with some surprising A-listers — Kieran Culkin played Ralphie while Howie Mandel was the narrative voice of an older Ralphie, for starters. Sadly, the movie was a complete flop in theaters, grossing just $71,000 against a $15 million budget. Critics were also lukewarm on it at the time.
The franchise was then allowed to rest for a few years until the straight-to-DVD sequel A Christmas Story 2 was released in 2012. This was the first movie made without any input from Shepherd, although elements of his stories were included loosely. This movie got generally negative reviews, but you can find it streaming on Philo or available to rent or purchase on PVOD stores.
Finally, most fans likely remember the 2022 sequel A Christmas Story Christmas, which found Peter Billingsley reprising his role as a grown-up Ralphie. This movie went straight to HBO Max, and it was an instant hit. Only time will tell if it becomes a classic like the original, but it seems safe to say that many fans will be revisiting in this year. It’s streaming now on Max along with A Christmas Story.
