I'm trying
something different to get in the holiday spirit this year. Every
day, from now through Christmas, I will be watching a different
Christmas movie or television special. I have compiled the list of
features ahead of time and am drawing one, at random, from my
Christmas stocking everyday to determine what gets watched. Thank
you for joining me in this endeavor. I really wonder if anyone is
even reading these introductions anymore. Whatever, what is day
sixteen's feature?
A Christmas Story
(1983)
Long before this was played 24 hours a day every Christmas Eve on
TBS, this film was a staple of my family's holiday season. Family
legend holds that, one Christmas Eve, my mom was waiting up to
make sure that my brother and I were asleep so that Santa could make
his visit. Not an easy feat, as I was a particularly light and
unwilling sleeper on most of my childhood Christmas Eves. While
waiting she was looking for something to watch and stumbled upon this
film on whichever cable movie channel we had at that time. Although
she was originally just looking for something to pass the time, she
was soon engrossed in the movie. In the Christmases that followed
that year, my whole family would watch it on VHS. To this day, we
have the TBS marathon on as background noise to our Christmas revelry.
Synopsis
A
Christmas Story is more a series of vignettes rather than a full blow
story. It is told from the perspective of an adult Ralphie looking
back on his nine year old Christmas in roughly 1940. The only plot
thread that runs the whole way through the movie is Ralphie's quest
to get the one thing he truly wants for Christmas, a Red Ryder 200
shot range model air rifle with a compass in the stock and a thing
that tells time. Short of that, the movie is more about the comedy
drawn from the quiet family moments in the lead up to Christmas.
While I can't speak with certainty to the current generation, I
would hazard a guess that pretty much anyone watching this will see
shades of their own family in it.
In
regards to the one ongoing plot thread, we are introduced to it at
the start of the movie as we find Ralphie looking at the Red Ryder
air rifle longingly in the window of a local department store. His
quest to secure it takes many tracks. He hides an advertisement for
it in one of his mom's magazines. He tells his mom directly. He
writes his Christmas theme on it in school. And, he asks the
department store Santa for it. All of these attempts are thwarted
and he is met with the common refrain, “you'll shoot your eye out”.
Discouraged,
Christmas comes and it seems as though Ralphie won't receive the Red
Ryder air rifle. However, just when all hope seems lost, Ralphie's
dad points out another package behind the desk. Ralphie opens it up
and does indeed find the object of his desire. Ironically, upon its
first use a ricochet does hit him in his glasses. Regardless, ending
narration informs us that it was the greatest gift he had ever, or
would ever, receive.
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| "Okay Black Bart, now you get yours." |
Final Thoughts
I am certain that I lack any kind of objectivity on this film. It
has simply been a part of my holiday festivities for so long that I
can not imagine one without it. As stated earlier, I see so many
parallels to my own family in this that I can't help but love it.
Whether it is Ralphie's brother Randy hiding in the cabinets when he
is afraid of what their father will do when he finds out Ralphie was
in a fight or his mother shielding Raphie from that very same
potential punishment. Or Ralphie's father becoming something of a kid
himself simply because it is Christmas. The things that remind me of
my own family are far too numerous. I am glad that my excitement over Christmas forced my mom
to stay up as late as she did that Christmas Eve all those years ago.
It has given my family one of our longest running Christmas
traditions and introduced me to a film that will always make me think
fondly of them. While you might not get as much out of it as I do
and I could understand at this point in time if you feel that this
movie is being overplayed, if you can get distance and give this film
an honest try I am confident that you will find something to like
about it. That is all for day 16. Join me again tomorrow, I triple dog dare you.
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| Breach of etiquette, I know. |
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