Do any any Gen X and Y DU'ers "GET" the Movie "A Christmas Story?"

[KoKo]

Just wondering if any of you relate in any way?
Is this still a "funny/true" Christmas Story? Or, is it "Dated?"

[Nlighten1]

1. I don't get it.

I never liked that movie.

[Piperay]

19. Same here

and I'm a baby boomer. :shrug: I found it to be one of the most annoying movies I have ever tried to sit through. :argh:

[absyntheNsugar]

2. I liked it

but for me it's Jean Shepard's storytelling acumen - the man can tell a story.

I mean, think about the plot of the movie - its completely lame. A kid gets a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas. But the way it's told - that makes the movie in my opinion.

I also like Garrison Keillor too...

[mr_hat]

10. The story line is actually a conglomeration of plots >

from Jean Shepard's book of short stories, "Wanda Hickie's Night of Golden Memories" and, IIAMNM, "In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash."

Each of the highlights in the film -- the leg lamp, the Bumpus' dogs, the triple-dog-dare tongue, etc, was a short story unto itself.

Wonderful, evocative writing about life in post-WWII working-class East Chicago.

[CO Liberal]

17. He COULD Tell a Story

Jean Shepard passed away a few years back. :-(

I remember listening to his nightly radio show on WOR in New York. From 10:15 to 11:00 every weeknight, he would just sit there and talk, and it was truly riveting radio.

I also remember "Shepard's Pie", a show he did for New Jersey Public Television in the '70s about different parts of the Garden State. The show he did about the Lakehurst Naval Air Station was called "Put Away Your Zippo, Dear - The Hindenburg Is Landing".

I met him once at a book signing in Morristown, NJ. "Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories" had just come out, and I covered the event for my high school radio station (WJSV-FM). He was just as warm and friendly in person as he sounded on the radio.

Here's to you, Jean - excelsior!!!!

:toast:

[Scott Lee]

3. I loved it because it seemed more real than "Its a Wonderful Life"

Plus it was hilariously acted. I mean come on; tongue stuck on the lamppole, hoping upon hope for that one great gift, first profanity uttered before your parents. Classic!

[HuckleB]

4. Are you kidding?

It was us slacker Gen Xers who made that thing the cult hit it is today. I introduced the movie to almost ever boomer I know.

[elperromagico]

5. I get it, and I love it.

No further comments.

[mzmolly]

6. Love that movie.

And, I think it was 'dated' when it came out :)

[jpgray]

7. That movie RULES (nt)

[celestia671]

8. It's a classic!

Wouldn't be Christmas without it!


:bounce:

[Lars39]

9. Loved it and like the sequal, too.

[HuckleB]

12. Dude, like, grody.

"My Summer Story" (the sequel in question) is incredibly painful to watch. It's not in the same sport, much less the same league as "A Christmas Story."

[Lars39]

15. I only got to see part of the sequal, the part about the death-dueling top

Having played with them, I thought it was funny. :silly:

[lefty_mcduff]

11. One of the best Christmas flicks of all time!

Along with Christmas Carol (Alistar Simms B/W version, natch)

[mitchum]

13. Get It? It's the ONLY Christmas movie I like

The rest are two-bit Dickens ripoffs or that Capra tripe

[VOX]

14. "No, kid, you'll put your eye out!"

"Christmas Story" is among the best holiday-fare flicks.

Also like the Alastair Sim "Christmas Carol," and "The Bishop's Wife."

[Amaya]

16. One of my favorite movies

I love it and I 'get it' :)

[KoKo]

18. I'm wondering if "Magic Rat" and others have seen it......???

others here in Lounge.....???

[THUNDER HANDS]

41. of course I've seen it

Who hasn't seen it. The movie is on EVERY year. :)

And, yes, I can relate to it. I never wanted a bb gun. But I did always want an Inspector Gadget doll....eventually I got it. :D

[rustydog]

20. I not only get it, I lived it with millions of other "Boomers"

The clothes the cars, the fuses being blown, the blown x-mas tree light and subsequent hunt for the blown bulb. Washing your mouth out with soap! (yes it really happened!)
The school bully, the english essay graded by the teacher with comments! everything was a tongue-in-cheek microcosm of life in America in post-war America.

There are so many scenes in the movie that causes flash-backs of moments in our childhood that are priceless!

When I saw it it became my favorite X-mas movie.

[Kahuna]

25. Same here! It reminds me of my Christmas memories..

growing up. Once I saw that movie it became my favorite.

[KoKo]

31. A kid in my school looked and acted just like the bully in that movie!

When I first saw it it was creepy. He used to follow the littler kids around and terrorize them popping out of bush's at recess and stuff. He had "yellow teeth" because he never brushed them and looked just like that kid in the movie.

Happy story about him, was that he got "thrown out" (in those days schools did that). When he came back a year later he was changed and turned out to be a really nice guy. No one could figure it. But, at least it's always been good to know that he somehow grew out of it.

[Bozita]

39. Your description is "priceless"

I thank you, Rustydog.

[KoKo]

21. Kick with thanks for those who enjoyed X'Story!

I kinda feel it's timeless...but no one has "Red Ryder BB Guns anymore!"
:-(

[JI7]

22. i LOVE that movie

i'm 24 and i love that movie. i never get bored or tired of it.

[Kat45]

23. I'm a boomer, and I don't think if I've ever seen that movie!

The title doesn't sound the least bit familiar. :shrug:

[HuckleB]

24. Well, then, see it.

You'll laugh your boomer arse off.

[Kahuna]

26. Catch it when you can. Darren McGavin plays the dad...

It's both charming and a hoot.

[LizW]

27. Love it, love it

We've watched it dozens of times and the kids practically know it by heart.

When our neighbors dogs crap in our yard, my husband yells
"BUMPUSES!" :7

[DS1]

28. Timeless movie

.

[populistmom]

29. I actually never saw it

It came out when I was a kid and I have boys so likely I will see it, but I can't comment because I haven't seen it yet.

[Kitsune]

30. You'll shoot your eye out! You'll shoot your eye out!

I LOVE THAT MOVIE! XD

[stopbush]

32. We love it.

Have it on DVD. My kids (10 & 6) will probably watch it 20 times this season.

[HEyHEY]

33. I'm 24 and when I was ten got a Red Ryder BB gun for xmas

was a similiar story. ANd I get the movie 100 per cent....reminds me alot of growing up.

[scottcsmith]

34. I would have related...

...had the father been an ex-convict who beat his wife, was a racist drug addict who abused his step-children.

I guess that's a little depressing.

[DemBones DemBones]

35. We first saw it in the theater in 1984 -- I know for sure

because my mother was dying at the time and I remember telling her and my dad about the movie, scene by scene. My dad grew up in Cleveland and he said that the son of the director of the Cleveland Orchestra had shot his eye out with a BB gun so kids in Cleveland heard "You'll shoot your eye out!" all the time. This was all pre-Boomer times, though. My dad was born in 1917 so I'd say it was the late twenties at the earliest -- and I think the movie looks more late thirties-early forties. He also said the fire dept. did get called out for cases of tongues stuck to metal posts. And he had some great stories about bullies.

I bought the movie as soon as I could; it was too difficult to rent it at Christmas because it was always out. Now they show it on TV, of course, round the clock on one of the movie channels the past couple of years. It's a great movie! Everybody identifies with something in the movie and most people identify with several things. You may have to be an older Boomer to identify with the dad fighting the furnace, though.

[KoKo]

36. Just another kick......

:kick:

[ChoralScholar]

37. I guess

being born in 1977, I am a Gen X-er, and I grew up with the movie and love it. I never get tired of watching it on TBS. My wife however, hates it. She doesn't "get" things that are funny for the sake of funny, or funny because it's so stupid. This movie has both.

I leave you with this:

Frah JEE Lay ... hmmmm... must be Italian :)

[RandomKoolzip]

38. "Hosticle Fifer!!!"

God, I love that movie! (I'm 28.) My wife had never seen it, and so we rented it a couple summers ago, and now she too can quote freely from "A Christmas Story."

[Loonman]

40. I get it. Movie is a classic.

:)

[NashVegas]

42. I Got It. What I Don't Get ...

... is why someone in a TV network program department thinks it's such a classic that it needs to get a 24 hour run. My guess is they know people will enjoy it when it's on, or at least not be annoyed by it, but won't make an appointment to sit down for it, or tape it.

[supernova]

43. 50/50

I do get it because I was a kid in the 60s, but we're already straying into Xer territory here. I understand it more through the eyes of my brother and sister who are older than me.

I still enjoy the movie because I adore Gene Shepeard's writing, and his delivery. Master storyteller we lost.

[politicat]

44. Do I look stupid? Of course I get it. *grin*

You don't want to know the dangerous junk mum and dad bought for us, the tacky crap my dad fell in love with, or the freak stunts my sibs pulled - AZ, so walking across the hot cement (and getting blisters) barefoot instead of licking the pole....

Not all parents of gen-x and y nots were overprotective, too responsible, and kept us from every harm.

The fact that my sisters and I survived child hood with our senses intact, a sense of good and bad taste instead of none at all is merely a testament to my family's luck.

Politicat (who remembers getting in trouble for fibbing at about 11 years old, having to wash mouth out with soap - ivory - and later asking mum if she'd go to washington and do the same with the president and Mr. North. (Iran Contra hearings.) Remembers mum looking really disturbed.)

[indigo32]

45. I love it!

eom

[vi5]

46. I think I"m a Gen Xer and I like it....

I'm 34 years old and love that movie. It's a classic. My 22 year old sister-in-law and her friends love it as well so I'm assuming they are not the only ones.

[Tracer]

47. Such a funny, charming film!

So much of it rings completely true to the period.

I clearly remember listening to the RADIO as eagerly as (Peter Benchley). Oh, did I ever want my "code rings"!!

We watch this movie faithfully every Christmas.

[soleft]

48. The most amazing thing is that it's a Bob Clark film

The man who brought us Porkys

[proud patriot]

49. My dad atually had the ovaltine decoder ring and remembers

breaking a code the said "drink ovaltine" he felt
the same betrayal . ...

We watch the movie once a year as a tradition .

[bmbmd]

50. Do NOT watch this movie.

You'll put your eye out.

[youngred]

51. I never got the appeal

everyone raves about how great it is but I never thought it was that good