The Real Underlying Message of “A Christmas Story.”
1 Corinthians 13:11 When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child. When I became a man, I did away with childish things.
I just looked at an article from “The Blaze” about
Hidden gems: Jean Shepherd’s 'A Christmas Story' is WAY deeper than you thought
If you don’t know what we’re talking about; the movie “A Christmas story” is a story set at Christmas time in 1940 America. It is the story of Ralphie, a prepubescent boy, the oldest of two boys, who is obsessed one Christmas with convincing the powers that be, (mother, father, teacher and Santa Claus) that the best possible gift for him that year would be a Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-shot Range Model air rifle. (A Red Ryder Bee-bee gun)
I, along with millions, love this movie.
And I was initially intrigued with the “Blaze” article title because it promised some insight into why I and so many others make it an annual tradition to watch the now familiar tale. But after having read the article, I was sorely disappointed. The article gave some insights into what the author was thinking as he wrote the piece in the original book, but I didn’t think that they captured the reason for the draw to the movie. If you want to read the article, I’ve linked it below.
I read it and it seemed far removed from anything I felt as I watched the film. So, I started thinking about the movie, and I ended up with what I think is the core point of identification that so many of us have with the movie.
I think we identify with it because it tells the story of a common angst in childhood, particularly for boys. It is the story of that time of life when a young boy is transitioning from boyhood to manhood; and all the obstacles that seem to be purposely placed in our way. The Bee-bee gun represents “becoming grown-up,” “being taken seriously,” “joining the ranks of the adult table.”
And the movie perfectly captures that feeling of having one foot in childhood, but desperately desiring to break free from that smothering over-protective era of your life. And it is story is perfectly set in a by-gone era.
The movie, I think, is most relatable to adults from my generation and beyond. I was born on the back end of the boomers and the front end of the busters generation. (1965). The boomer children were in the middle of a societal shift. They were no longer required to work, as children, in the way previous generations had been. So, they were allowed to experience “play” in a way that many generations before had not. But the buster generation was the beginning of the “what were we thinking” generation.
We were the generations where the change started in how parents were raising their kids. The boomers, because they didn’t have to work, were raised by parents who seemingly thrust their kids out into the world without regard for danger or compassion. They are the generation who were sent out the door during summer vacation to wander and run about the town until sundown. Their parents didn’t seem concerned to know where the kids were all day. But, they knew that they better be in the house when the streetlights came on, or there was hell to pay.
In the buster generation, because of television, and a slow break-down of societal norms, parents became increasingly concerned about danger. The change also came because children’s play became less focused outdoors and less active. Busters spent more time consuming media in the living room rather than wandering the neighborhood.
And so we had a societal shift because of economic prosperity. And with each successive generation, the transition from childhood to adulthood was lengthened. My father, who was born in the depression and WW2 era, told us stories of actually working as a child. Their family had a farm, and as soon as he was able, he worked alongside his siblings to contribute to the family’s survival. But the post war Boomer generation that followed was the first one where prosperity swept the country. Now values shifted. Parents didn’t want their children to have to work and slave so early in life. Children just needed to learn, and play. So, parents set them free to ride the neighborhoods. And as the television set became the focal point of the living room, outside play began to fade away.
All of these societal trends, and where we fit in them, really gives us insight into why the movie “A Christmas Story” hits home. It is the story of a child trying to grow up and be taken seriously. Ralphie is the boy who desperately feels that internal pull to manhood. He is no longer happy with the limitations of childhood. He is beginning to question why kids are not allowed the freedoms of adulthood. Why can’t he have a gun? Why can his father say certain words, but he can’t? What is the attraction he feels to the leg lamp, and why is it forbidden?
Throughout the entire movie, it seems that everyone is trying to thwart his attempts at growing up. He feels the perpetual presence of a safety net that feels like a cage. That is the central meaning behind the “Red Rider Bee-bee gun.” He wants to be a man. He wants to be courageous and independent and dangerous. But everyone pushes him back with an allegorical, and sometimes literal boot to the face. He is petitioning for help in his quest, but his mother wants to keep him a child out of fear. “You’ll shoot your eye out.” His petitions go unanswered from everyone he asks; his mother, his teacher and Santa. Even his father seems complicit in keeping him a child by sheer indifference.
And the gun is not the only allusion to that inner pull to maturation. His brother Randy is the quintessential child that Ralphie is trying to escape. His mother has to play disgusting games to make Randy eat. She wraps him up in coats and scarves so tight that he can’t function or breathe. His brother is the picture of helpless smothered child that Ralphie is trying to break free of. She wants Ralphie and his brother to remain children. That’s why she seems oblivious to why Ralphie doesn’t appreciate the “bunny pajamas” his aunt gifted him. Ralphie wants badly to be a man. That’s why he is so disappointed when he finally gets his “Little Orphan Annie Decoder Ring.” He thinks that when he gets this ring, he will be a part of a network of kids who are helping Little Orphan Annie fight marauders and bad guys. But the first message he decodes is just a stupid commercial for Ovaltine. Even the one glimmer of hope for manhood, helping his father change the tire, is dashed we he utters an explicative, and ends up with a bar of Lifebuoy soap in his mouth.
His dream of being significant and being taken seriously are crushed at every turn.
But the real turning point of the movie is the “Scut Farkus affair.” Scut Farkus is the perennial evil bully who torments Ralphie and his friends at every turn of the film. He fits the bill of a stereotypical bully. Red hair, yellow teeth, coon skin cap, and a toady side kick in Grover Dill. After all the disappointments and downright defeats that Ralphie has experienced in his quest for the gun, he is dejected and distraught. And as he makes his way home, he is ambushed by Scut with a snowball to the face. This is too much. He is overwhelmed with the childhood emotions of powerlessness.
Then Farkus starts to taunt Ralphie saying “What are you going to cry baby?!” “Cry, baby, cry.” But something was happening in Ralphie. “Deep in the recesses of my brain... a tiny red-hot little flame began to grow.”
Suddenly all the frustration began bubbling up. The frustration of not being heard. The frustration of (s)mothering. The frustration of being treated as a child. And in that moment, Ralphie takes the initiative to become a man. Over all the obstacles that have been placed in his way, He tears into Scut Farkus with a tackle, successive blows, and a torrent of curse words that would have made his father’s flowery tirades pale in comparison. In that moment, he would no longer be pushed down or undervalued. He broke through the crusted earth of childhood, to the flowering of manhood.
Of course, we know that nothing is ever that simple. Becoming a man is a process, not a point in time. It’s interesting that it is his mother that pulls him away from that virile expression of masculinity. And he is in tears when she does it. But what we discover in the scenes that follow is that his mother was never an adversary in regard to his growing up. She recognizes the significance of what has just happened. She recognizes the frustration. And she doesn’t tell his father about the over-the top fighting and swearing. She passes it off as “boys will be boys.” But I think she does so because she sees Ralphie differently. And Ralphie acknowledges that moment as well. He says..
“I slowly began to realize I was not about to be destroyed. (by my father) From then on, things were different between me and my mother.”
From that moment Ralphie begins to see that his parents are not trying to thwart his maturation, they are trying to guard his safety in the process. Even his father, who he thought was oblivious to his quest, ends up being the one to secretly get him the Red Rider Bee-bee gun. He is handing him a rite of passage.
Of course, becoming a man doesn’t mean that you no longer do childish things. Ralphie goes out with his new Bee-bee gun, and first shot out of the barrel, the bee-bee ricochets and hits his glasses. He could have indeed “shot his eye out.” And of course, he is not yet man enough to own up to what has happened. So, he childishly lies to his mother.
But it’s okay. He has made the first steps in a life-long transition. He has reached a new level of respect from his mother, father, and friends. And so, the story can be closed with the symbol of that transition laying at his side as he passes into a night of sleep on that momentous Christmas day.
That’s my take on the reason “A Christmas Story” strikes the heart cords of so many. We all, at least in my generation, have felt the identity struggle of changing from childhood to adulthood. We have been frustrated because our bodies and minds are telling us that we should be respected more and have more autonomy. But, we feel stifled by unreasonable rules and antiquated values. And we feel encumbered by fear that we will never reach adulthood and be taken seriously.
But, like Ralphie, many of us eventually come to realize that it wasn’t parents, teachers, schools, or society that held us back. It was our own inner child. It was our fear. It was our dependency mindset. Our parents, teachers, and society were not trying to stifle us, they were just cautioning us to step forward cautiously and wisely so we wouldn’t hurt ourselves and others as we move to adulthood.
And that is why this movie resonates with me. It speaks to the little boy in me who, even at 59 years of age, still feels like I haven’t fully become a man. Maybe it’s this generation that we are living in that turns life into a constant search for play and fun. But something in me still hungers to become a mature man.
1 Corinthians 13:11 When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child. When I became a man, I did away with childish things. 12 For now we see in a mirror [f]dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known.13 But now abide faith, hope, love—these three; but the [g]greatest of these is love.
References
https://achristmasstory.fandom.com/wiki/A_Christmas_Story_(Transcript)