Christine 1983

     This film is based on a book by Stephen King and the beginning is set in Detroit of 1957.  A red Plymouth Fury is coming down the assembly line and one of the line workers is killed in the car.  In 1983, Arnold Cunningham sees this same Fury in a backyard and he must have this car.  The Fury doesn’t look at all like the car it was in 1957.  The paint is dull and the upholstery is worn but the radio still plays.  There is a self-repair garage in their town and Arnie starts to work on the car.  Everything about Arnie begins to change after the purchase of Christine.  He starts to date Leigh Cabot, the most beautiful girl in the high school class.  He becomes more self-assured and cocky.  Some jealous tough guys in school go to check out Christine and they do a LOT of damage to the body.  Christine isn’t very happy about this because she was back to how she looked on the assembly line.

      I was nervous about seeing this film in earlier years but now it’s not scary at all.  You know what’s going to happen to anyone that messes with Christine or makes her mad or jealous!!  An unusual occurrence is that Christine had over 90,000 miles when Arnie bought her but her mileage is going down?  Christine is a beautiful car and since I appreciate cars, I didn’t like seeing her beat up!!  4* (I really liked this movie)

111 min, Horror directed by John Carpenter with Keith Gordon, John Stockwell, Alexandra Paul, Robert Prosky Harry Dean Stanton, Christine Felford, Roberts Blossom, William Ostrander, David Spielberg, Steven Tash.

Note:  Imdb 6.7 out of 10, Roger Ebert 3*, Rotten Tomatoes 69% critic 63% audience, Roger Ebert 3*, Amazon 4.6* out of 5* with 789 reviews, Metacritic 57 out of 100 with 10 critics 8.7 out of 10 with 24 reviews, Empire Online 2* out of 5*.

Special Note:  Filmed in Calabasas, Newhall, Los Angeles, Burbank, Monrovia, Santa Clarita, South Pasadena and Oak Park, California.  The production of this film started before the book was published due to Stephen King’s popularity.  Alexandra Paul has the role of Leigh Cabot and she has a twin sister.  Her sister Caroline often stood in for her during scenes.  At times Christine’s windows are blacked out and that’s to conceal the stunt driver.  It also made it difficult for the driver to see because the scenes were at night.  Twenty-four cars were purchased and rebuilt into seventeen cars used in filming.  Two other Plymouth models were used, the Belvedere and the Savoy.  Some of the damages to Christine are to plastic that looks like metal on camera.  Hydraulic pumps were installed on the inside of the body and they sucked the paneling inwards.  Reverse of the footage showed the appearance of the body retaking form.  Kevin Bacon was offered the lead role of Arnie but he filmed Footloose of 1984 instead.  The total gross for this film was $21,017,849 with an estimated budget of $9,700,000 for a gain of $11,317,849.