A Christmas Story is a 1983 semi-biographical film based on the short stories of author Jean Shepherd collected in the book In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash.

The film relates the tale of Ralphie Parker, who wants a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas and will go to any lengths to get it, despite adults' admonition that "you'll shoot your eye out." It stars Darren McGavin, Melinda Dillon , and Peter Billingsley . His father caught him using a strong instance of profanity and, as a result, his mother punishes him by putting Lifebuoy soap in his mouth for swearing. Ralphie received a C+ on his holiday essay for writing the essay on the "Red Ryder BB Gun."

The movie was written by Jean Shepherd and directed by Bob Clark.

Overlooked as a sleeper film when it was first released, A Christmas Story has become widely popular since and is now a perennial Christmas special. Turner Network Television owns the broadcast rights, and consecutively airs it 12 times over a 24 hour period every Christmas.

Movie sequels involving Ralphie and his family are Ollie Hopnoodle's Haven of Bliss and My Summer Story.

In the year 2000, an authorized stage play adaptation of "A Christmas Story" was written by Philip Grecian (Dramatic Publishing, ISBN 1 58342031-2)and is produced widely in the English-speaking world each Christmas season. In 2003, Broadway Books published the five Jean Shepherd short stories from which the movie and stage play were adapted in a single volume under the title "A Christmas Story," ISBN 0-7679-1622-0. The stories included in the volume are: "Duel in the Snow, or Red Ryder nails the Cleveland Street Kid", "The Counterfeit Secret Circle Member Gets the Message, or The Asp Strikes Again," "My Old Man and the Lascivious Special Award that Heralded the Birth of Pop Art," "Grover Dill and the Tasmanian Devil," and "The Grandstand Passion Play of Delbert and the Bumpus Hounds."

External Links

• A Christmas Story at the Movie Tome
• A Christmas Story at the Internet Movie Database