Reply #34: More evidence [View All]

[pokerfan]

Director Bob Clark stated in the film's commentary CD that he and author Shepherd wished for the movie to be seen as "amorphously late 30s, early 40s." The film is not specifically about a given year, it is about a particular time in American family life. The film appears to be set roughly around the tail end of the Great Depression but before the United States involvement in World War II. There are references throughout the film that viewers enjoy linking to particular years, and if one connects a reference to a particular year, the movie can be dated as being as early as 1935 or as late as 1947. Some of the other year clues include the following:

* 1935: In the scene where Ralphie and his friends peer into the Higbee's toy store window, Lionel's model of the Union Pacific M-10000 can be seen running around a loop of track. That model was made from 1935 to 1941.
* Pre-1937: The tin Zeppelin mentioned in the original story ("it rolls and it beeps"), and appearing unremarked under the Christmas tree. Zeppelin travel ended for all intents and purposes with the Hindenburg disaster on May 6, 1937.
* 1937: Reference in the newspaper quiz to Snow White, released by Disney that year. Snow White can also be seen in the Higbee's window.
* 1937: The Parker family car.
* 1937: A Big Little Book of "Pat Nelson: Ace of Test Pilots" appears in Miss Shields' desk drawer of confiscated toys and novelties.
* 1938: The color comics on Christmas Day, implying a Sunday. Christmas fell on a Sunday in 1938.
* 1939: Characters from The Wizard of Oz, released that year, appear in the Christmas parade. Ralphie's teacher, Miss Shields, also appears as the Wicked Witch in one of his classroom fantasies.
* 1940: The license plates on the cars are silver (white) on a black field. Those were the colors of the Indiana license plates that year.
* 1940: Each year, Ovaltine brought out a different model for this decoder ring. The Radio Orphan Annie secret decoder model used in the movie is the 1940 model.<30>
* 1943: The Bing Crosby/Andrews Sisters recordings of "Jingle Bells" and "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" are both very clearly heard on the living room radio (both recorded on September 27, 1943).
* 1946: Ralphie's father complains in the movie that "the Sox traded Bullfrog!" which is a reference to Chicago White Sox pitcher Bill Dietrich, who was in fact released from the Sox, not traded, in 1946.<31>
* 1947: The police car in the schoolyard scene.

Many other year specific references can be found in the film.

1939-40 is slightly later than author Jean Shepherd's own childhood (he was 19 years old in 1940) but earlier than that of director Bob Clark (who was born in 1939). While Shepherd was age 10 in 1931, Clark was age 10 in 1949 - a separation of 18 years. If the consensus between Shepherd and Clark was to find a "middle-ground" for their youths, they may well have divided the difference in half (9), then added that amount of years to the earliest date (1931), thereby arriving at 1940.

These minor contradictory items only indicate what director Bob Clark said in his commentary, as previously stated above: The film is set in the "amorphously later Thirties, early Forties." The movie is intended as a credible, warm and thoroughly inviting memory of an innocent American Christmas around the World War II era. The individual viewer can elect to date the film to any year they wish, but for whatever year they choose, many contradictions occur within the film, and this fits exactly with the writer and directors idea of "around 1940".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Christmas_Story#Settings