With the festive season in full swing, many people are returning to the comfort of old movie classics to kickstart their Christmas advent. One of the most iconic festive classics is A Christmas Story. Full of childhood wonders, slapstick comedy, and the reality of dealing with family during Christmas, A Christmas Story is surely one of the best Christmas films to revisit.
A Christmas Story earned itself a sequel this year, proving that it’s still a popular film. Set in Indiana in the 1940s, the movie follows its nine-year-old protagonist Ralphie Parker as he tries to convince his parents and others to buy him a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas. With its idiosyncratic characters and candid representations of family life, A Christmas Story is full of memorable moments.
Spoilers ahead!
8 “Fra-GEE-lay! It must be Italian!”
When Ralphie’s father wins a major award as part of a contest, he is ecstatic at its swift arrival that same night. The mystery reward shows up at the Parkers’ house in a large wooden box hauled in by two delivery men. Mr Parker reads out the stamp on the outside of the box, misinterpreting the fragile label as a descriptor for what is inside written in a foreign language. The award turns out to be a leg-shaped lamp in a fishnet stocking which Ralphie’s mother detests.
7 "Meatloaf, smeatloaf, double beatloaf. I hate meatloaf."
Ralphie’s younger brother, Randy, is notorious for his picky eating and his outright refusal of meals that the family is eating. While it’s not unusual for children to be fussy around mealtimes at this age, Ralphie goes on to explain that Randy had not eaten voluntarily in three years.
So, when Mrs Parker serves up meatloaf for dinner, Randy wastes no time in letting everyone know that he hates meatloaf. Viewers who were picky kids, or have picky kids, have undoubtedly heard Randy’s improvised poem repeated many times.
6 “I triple dog dare ya!”
Flick and Schwartz, Ralphie’s two closest friends, have an intense argument in the early part of the movie about whether or not their tongues would stick to a metal pole in the freezing winter weather. During their lunchtime break, this argument comes to a head when Schwartz dares Flick to test it out and prove that it won’t stick.
This sets off a head-to-head battle where Schwartz repeatedly ups the ante of his dare until he finally skips to the triple dog dare. Flick has no choice but to take the dare and ends up bawling with his tongue stuck to the pole.
5 “That is ... the ugliest lamp I have ever seen in my entire life!”
Despite the rest of the Parker family becoming obsessed with the ‘major award’ lamp, Mrs Parker dislikes it quite obviously. At first, she deals with it in more passive ways, like turning it off so it can’t be seen from the street. But as time goes on, she becomes more embarrassed by it and eventually takes matters into her own hands.
When she confesses to the supposed accident of breaking the lamp, Mr Parker accuses her of being jealous. Mrs Parker scoffs and tells him her true thoughts about the lamp. The two bicker as Mr Parker tries to fix it, but Mrs Parker comes out victorious as the lamp is ultimately unable to be fixed.
4 “Poetry! Sheer poetry!”
One facet of Ralphie’s plan to get his hands on the BB gun includes the writing of a perfect theme as his homework assignment. Confident in his writing prowess, Ralphie daydreams about his teacher’s reaction to reading the piece about the gun and being overcome with emotion.
However, his hopes are dashed when his teacher only gives the piece a C+. The inclusion of this in the storyline harkens back to the universal childhood disappointment of expecting the highest mark and receiving an awful one instead.
3 “A crummy commercial? Son of a b****.”
Ralphie’s favorite radio drama is the Little Orphan Annie show, sponsored by Ovaltine. He’s such a huge fan that he drinks gallons of the stuff in order to win an official decoder pin. At the end of each episode, there is a secret message for this elite inner circle of fans, and Ralphie is anxious to decipher it.
But when the decoder reveals that the secret message is nothing more than a directive to drink more Ovaltine products, Ralphie is understandably disappointed. After all, there’s nothing worse than being tempted by exclusive content and having to suffer through an ad instead.
2 "Aunt Clara had for years labored under the delusion that I was not only perpetually four years old but also a girl."
On Christmas Day, Ralphie is gifted a candy-pink bunny suit by his well-meaning but out-of-touch Aunt Clara. Forced to try it on by his gushing mother, Ralphie is miserable in it. Even his father can see how uncomfortable he is and convinces Mrs Parker to let him take it off. But not before he agrees to wear it when Aunt Clara visits. Almost every child will have a story like Ralphie’s. An optimistic yet delusional gift giver seems to be present in every family tree.
Still, the Russian roulette of presents is all part of the Christmas fun.
1 “You’ll shoot your eye out, kid.”
The most ever-present theme in this classic Christmas movie is Ralphie’s quest for the official Red Ryder carbine-action 200-shot range model air rifle. From leaving subtle hints around the house to asking his mom, his teacher, and even Santa Claus for the gift directly, Ralphie stops at nothing to try and get a hold of his beloved BB gun. But at every step of the way, he is met with this same unbeatable argument from the adults.
Ralphie does end up getting his Christmas wish and indeed nearly shoots his eye out. But from this, he learns that maybe the adults knew a little of what they were talking about after all.