A Christmas Story

A Christmas Story (1983)

11 mistakes since 9 Jan '18, 00:00

(9 votes)

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."

Factual error: On Christmas morning when the Parker's are opening gifts, several Christmas songs can be heard playing in the background. Several of these were released long after when the movie is set (around 1940), particularly Bing Crosby's performance of "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas," which was released in October of 1951.

wizard_of_gore

Revealing mistake: The wind up tank in the toy store window can't possibly be a continual display. Clearly a production assistant wound up and released the tank for the shot. It's not a toy that would be moving with the other display items.

Wreckdiver36

Continuity mistake: The old man throws straw everywhere getting his prize out of the crate, and a lot of it goes on his back. The straw disappears when he climbs out of the crate.

manthabeat

Factual error: During the tongue on the flagpole scene, the police car that pulls up is a '46 or a '47 Chevrolet sedan. If this movie is supposed to take place pre-WWII, that car wouldn't have existed yet.

Continuity mistake: In the kitchen, after the father comes in to get warm water for his car, the 2 boxes of soap powder move from the left side of the sink to a wall shelf on the right.

Factual error: Early in the film, while the kids are looking at the toys in the Higbee's store window, two uniformed soldiers are visible right behind the kids. The female soldier is wearing sergeant stripes on her sleeves, but the braid on her garrison cap is gold - a color reserved for commissioned officers.

Texijapi

Visible crew/equipment: During the parade, the camera moves in and back a couple of times and the operator's shadow is visible left screen. This is really obvious after the Wizard of Oz characters walk by.

manthabeat

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

Continuity mistake: In the very beginning the camera is panning, showing Ralph's house next to an empty lot and continues past, showing that across the street is a corner house with hedges. So Ralph's front window would be staring up a street and a line of hedges running up the street. When his father wins the award, the neighbors have their backs to the hedges with the large white house in back of them. This would have them staring across the other street, not at Ralph's house.

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

Suggested correction: This is wrong. The hedge runs both up 11th St. (Cleveland St.) and Rowley Ave. You can tell this is the correct shot, which includes the side of the house (window and porch) behind the old man.

Factual error: In the beginning of the movie, when they are in front of Higbees, there is an RTA sign on the building in the background. RTA in Cleveland did not exist until around 1975.

Dad: 'Fra-gee-lay', that must be Italian.

More quotes from A Christmas Story

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 do the parents have two twin beds in their bedroom, instead of one double bed? I thought that was just a TV gimmick from the old days when they weren't allowed to show a man and woman in bed together. Did people really sleep like that, or was it just a production design decision for the film? The movie was made in the '80's after all.

Krista

Answer: It's most likely a reference to the twin-bed movie standards from the time in which the movie takes place (late '30s to early '40s).

Chosen answer: Many married couples did (and still do) sleep like this. For example, one may be a restless sleeper and not wish to disturb their partner. Or they may just prefer to sleep alone. It's all down to personal choice, I don't think there's a rule that says couples have to share a bed.

umathegreatstationarybear

The original poster has never been married. It is seldom that husbands and wives continue sleeping in the same bed after the first couple years of marriage.

Charles Austin Miller

Very interesting... I know of only one couple that sleeps in different beds. That is because they are on different sleep schedules. I know many couples and we all sleep with our spouses. Don't get me wrong, if we get a hotel room that has 2 full or queen beds, we are sleeping in individual beds. But other then that, we sleep in our bed together.

"Seldom" is a bit of an overstatement - studies seem to suggest about 15-25% of couples sleep separately.

Studies? Could you provide a link to such studies? I speak from decades of knowing many, many happily-married couples, the overwhelming majority of whom sleep in separate beds and even separate rooms.

Charles Austin Miller

15 per cent of Britons said if cost and space were not an issue, they would sleep in a different bed to their partner: https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/uk-couples-sleep-separate-beds-partner-yougov-survey-a8504716.html. A 2005 National Sleep Foundation poll found that nearly one in four American couples sleeps in separate beds or separate rooms: https://sleepfoundation.org/sites/default/files/subscription/sub003.txt. Clearly many couples do, but many don't. Certainly the vast majority of couples I know share a bed, regardless of how long they've been together. "Seldom" is I think overstating it. The majority of people you know may sleep separately, and more power to them! No right or wrong, but that doesn't appear to reflect the broader picture.

Answer: Very common, especially back in the first half of the 20th century, for couples to sleep in separate beds.

More questions & answers from A Christmas Story

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.