Movie Review: 'A Christmas Story Christmas' Satisfies Nostalgia, Emotion
LOS ANGELES, Nov. 15 (UPI) — In the 1983 movie A Christmas Story, a loving family is really old-fashioned during a dysfunctional period. A Christmas Story Christmas, which premieres Thursday on HBO Max, keeps that feeling of family love in the modern era with a satisfying dose of nostalgia.
In the new movie, the year is 1973 and Ralphie Parker (Peter Billingsley) is now a father - 30 years after the original movie's 1940s setting. The Parkers plan to invite Ralphie's parents over for Christmas, but Ralphie receives a tragic phone call.
The sheikh's seemingly natural cause of death was so sudden that they expected it within two days. Essentially, Christmas Story is about the death of actor Darren McGavin, just as Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is about the death of Chadwick Boseman.
The Parkers return to Homan, Indiana, to spend Christmas with Ralph's mother (Julie Hagerty). Of course, they celebrate Christmas before the funeral, but Ralph has to write the obituary, which is a recurring theme throughout the movie.
A Christmas Story Christmas is still credited to Gene Shepherd's In God We Trust, and Everyone Else Pays Cash, the same group of stories on which A Christmas Story and other spin-offs are based. In the book, Flick (Scott Schwartz) owned a bar in Hochman, so this sequel still has some elements of Shepherd.
Most of the time, Ralphie plays hit songs from A Christmas Story, but there's a good reason for that. The family has traditions that they follow every year and they are never the same.
In 1973, for example, they adopted the " A Christmas Story " tradition in a slightly different way. At least Santa Higby makes Ralphie's kids more fun at the supermarket.
The Parkers' neighbors, the Pompos, still have dogs, though they should be new litters in 30 years. Ralph finds Easter eggs from his childhood in the attic.
This time, the three-time daredevil gets revenge on Flick Schwartz (RD Robb) for the flagpole accident in A Christmas Story.
Ralphie still has fantasies that look like old movie sketches where he imagines saving the day with his BB gun or going blind from soap poisoning. The Western vision of Black Bart (Nicola Colicos) continues to be ruled by someone.
As an adult, Ralphie's plans are not as complicated as when she was a child. He's still making history for bringing home his brother Randy (Ian Petrella) for Christmas.
"A Christmas Story " fans will also recognize the score. Sentimental subject matter, touches of farce, and even the Big Bad Wolf theme return in this theme.
Not every scene from A Christmas Story is repeated. No more ovals and luckily no more Chinese Christmas cartoons.
And with all that nostalgia, A Christmas Story also brings a lot of new things to Christmas. The Parker family loves snowballs, and Flick's Bar has an appropriately bizarre sequence where every time the phone rings, customers freak out and hope it doesn't work for them.
Christmas brings another gift-giving disaster, and a visit to the emergency room is every parent's nightmare any time of the year. Drunken Sleigh Ride is another new trail and perhaps the hottest one.
There are some modern touches, like cutting out some of the Christmas carols that appear in every Christmas movie.
When filmmakers try to reinvent a style they've done before, it inevitably sounds like "Xerox-Xerox." Billingsley is now a producer and the writers have adapted The Shepherd, but there are still many differences between the films.
First of all, Hollywood doesn't shoot a movie anymore, so a digital sequel doesn't look like it, and they sometimes cut parts of A Christmas Story where you can tell the difference. Director Bob Clarke is gone and it will be impossible to recreate the 39-year-old production.
But in 2012, Warner Home Entertainment produced a straight-to-video A Christmas Story 2 with an all-new cast. The returning cast seem to appreciate continuity.
Whether you're reinventing classic combinations or inventing new ones, the main theme is that the Parkers love each other and wish the kids a Merry Christmas. However, the obligatory Christmas miracle in both films is undeniably sentimental.
Perhaps A Christmas Carol isn't as timeless a classic as its predecessor. But if you can't get enough of the 1983 movie after the TBS 24-Hour Marathon, this is a great sequel.
Fred Tobel, who attended the Ithaca College film school, is a UPI entertainment writer based in Los Angeles. He has been a professional film critic since 1999, a critic for Rotten Tomatoes since 2001, and a member of the Television Critics Association since 2012. Learn more about his work in entertainment.
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