December 25, 2013
FROM THE ARCHIVES: SIGN SAYS CLEARANCE TO THE TWELVE FOOT LINE, BUT THEM CHICKENS WAS STACKED TO 13' 9":
Red Ryder's Eternal Home on the Range: Ralphie's hero now has a fitting tribute. (MARK YOST, December 23, 2003, Wall Street Journal)
PAGOSA SPRINGS, Colo.--If the umpteen showings of A Christmas Story and a new 20th-anniversary, two-disc DVD set aren't enough to sate your appetite for Ralphie Parker and his tortured quest for a Red Ryder BB gun, then you need to head to this little town in the southwest corner of Colorado. It's home to the Fred Harman Art Museum.Who's Fred Harman, you ask? He's the cartoonist who created Ralphie's hero, Red Ryder, and his Indian sidekick, Little Beaver.
As if the connection to A Christmas Story didn't suffice to make one think about violating the Time Zone Rule, The greatest Country and Western tune of all time comes to its thrilling conclusion against "the side of a feed store In downtown Pagosa Springs.
[originally posted: 2003-12-23]
Posted by oj at December 25, 2013 12:55 AM
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Er ... Am I the only one who never got caught up in the "A Christmas Story" mania?
It seems awfully irreverent to make for a laudable Christmas movie. I don't know... I just never got how it became an immediate "classic."
Posted by: DG at December 24, 2003 9:33 AMDG:
Recall that many of us are old enough to have listened to Jean Shepherd on the radio and read his stories as they came out.
Posted by: oj at December 24, 2003 10:22 AMIt's also one of the few Christmas movies to actually take a child's point of view of the holiday (which at Ralphie's age basically means "new toys") without being childish at the same time, thanks to Sheppard's original writing and narration in the film.
All the successful Christmas movies I can think of usually come at the holiday from an adult's perspective of Christmas; the ones that try to do it from a child's angle normally come out as insincere, due in part to modern Hollywood's natural cynicism the other 51 weeks of the year which makes them incapable of doing a holiday story without the manipulation being too close to the surface (and since I've yet to see this year's holiday hit, "Elf," I reserve judgment on that film's long-range success).
Posted by: John at December 24, 2003 2:35 PMHaving driven Wolf Creek pass in a big rig, I can tell you that it's not much better now.
Sure is pretty, though, even at night, if the moon's out.
Posted by: Michael Herdegen at December 25, 2003 3:45 AM
It's hard to believe Bob Clark, who made those gawdawful "Porky's" movies in the wake of the success of "Animal House" directed this film, which is really the only successful Christmas movie Hollyowood has released in the past 50 years (not counting 1964's "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians," of course).
Posted by: John at December 23, 2003 10:06 PM