A Christmas Story

Other mistake: When Ralphie and Flick are walking to school for the first time, they meet up with Schwartz, coming down the steps of his house which appears to be two houses down from Ralphie's. Later, when Ralphie is lying in bed after the soap in the mouth scene, the narrator (older Ralphie), states how "Three blocks away, Schwartz was getting his."

Rob Meears

Other mistake: When Pierre Andre is giving the members of the "Secret Society" their message, listen carefully. The first number is 12. Towards the end of the message he says 12 again. Since the first letter of the first word is "B", and there are no other "B's" in the entire message, I guess this is another one that slipped by the editor. They also say to set pins to B2, so 12 can't be B.

Other mistake: When the leg lamp is set up and turned on, the entire leg lights up. Trouble is, when you first see it, you can see there is no light in it, nor a fixture. Later, after it is broken, you again see no lighting of any kind in the leg. I don't think the light from its position on top of the leg would have illuminated the leg all the way down to the shoe at the bottom.

Movie Nut

A Christmas Story mistake picture

Other mistake: In the end credits, Santa's name in the song title "Santa Claus is Comin' to Town" is misspelled as "Clause."

Other mistake: At the end when Ralphie takes his gun outside to use for the first time the shot bounces back and hits him, knocking him off his feet. His gun comes in from the side a second later like someone tossed it into the shot. (01:40:00)

dabears51907

Other mistake: When the father "won" and he tells the family it was going to be sent "on tonight", he accidentally closes the door on one of the hound's ears. The dog starts moving up and down, which means the ear was thin enough to move around. If the ear was thin enough to move around, the dog could've just pulled itself out. (00:25:30 - 00:26:00)

Upvote valid corrections to help move entries into the corrections section.

Suggested correction: I'm sure the dog could have pulled itself out, however, that doesn't necessarily mean it would once it felt frightened from feeling its ear caught in the door. Dogs are funny like that, especially when they get scared. Sometimes they'll freeze and do little to help themselves even though they could. For some of them that's simply their survival instinct.

Other mistake: When dad comes home with the telegram saying that he won a "major award", look at the car. There is snow piled up on the top of the car, the windshields, and the hood, at least an inch thick. Even then, the hot engine would make the hood warm up, and in turn, melt at least some of the snow. And the windshields look like there was enough snow removed to guide the car, instead of removing as much as possible for safety. It looks like the car was simply pushed from off camera.

Movie Nut

Other mistake: When Ralphie has the fantasy about going blind, watch the Old Man when he asks how they could do what they did. He has his hand over his mouth, and he's trying to keep from laughing.

dewinela

Other mistake: When the old man screws in the blue light bulb on the Christmas tree and the lights go out in the house, the living room remains dark while he changes the fuse. Meanwhile a fire is going in the fireplace, so the light from the fire would cast some light into the room.

Continuity mistake: When Melinda Dillon breaks the lamp, it is broken into many pieces, but when Darren McGavin is gluing it back together it is now in much fewer and bigger broken pieces. Obviously different broken lamps were used.

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Trivia: Melinda Dillon was given the wrong script on purpose when they filmed the Chinese restaurant scene. She had no idea that when they brought the duck out it would have its head still attached. All of her reactions, including when she first sees the duck and when the server cuts the head off, were completely genuine.

dewinela

More trivia for A Christmas Story

Question: Why doesn't Ralphie's father realise he's the one who unintentionally taught his son how to cuss, much less buy his lame excuse?

Rob245

Answer: Because it's a funny look at real life. It's common for parents to cuss around their children, then be shocked when the kids start using the language themselves.

Exactly right. My parents cussed quite a bit when I was a child, but the first time I ever swore in front of my mother, she thought I learned it from watching The Real World with my sister.

immortal eskimo

True. I'd forgotten I learned how to cuss from my folks.

Rob245

Answer: I think he did know. When he tells Ralphie to get in the car after saying the bad word, he kinda laughs to himself. It's only after Mom razzes him about taking too long to change the tire that he decides to share that Ralphie swore.

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