Adapted by Bill Phillips (who has a cameo as the boombox-toting junkyard worker) from Stephen King's 1983 novel of the same name, the movie follows the changes in the lives of Arnie Cunningham, his friends, his family, and his teenage enemies after he buys a classic red and white 1958 Plymouth Fury named Christine, a car that seems to have a mind of its own and a jealous, possessive personality, which has a bad influence on Arnie.
Released in the United States on December 9, 1983, Christine received generally positive reviews from critics and grossed $21 million at the box office. The film has since become a cult classic.[3]
Plot
In 1957, at an automobile factory in Detroit, a red 1958 Plymouth Fury slams its hood shut by itself on a worker's hand, while another worker is found dead inside the car after dropping cigar ash on its seats.
In 1978 Rockbridge, California, nerdy high school senior Arnold "Arnie" Cunningham is bullied on the first day of school by classmate Buddy Repperton and his gang. Arnie's only friend, Dennis Guilder, intervenes with help from a teacher, who sends Buddy and his gang to the principal's office. Buddy is subsequently expelled for possession of a switchblade.
After school, Arnie and Dennis see a dilapidated 1958 Plymouth Fury for sale at the home of George LeBay, the brother of the recently deceased original owner, who tells them the car's name is Christine. Despite Dennis' objections, Arnie purchases the car. Since Arnie's strict parents refuse to let him keep the car at their house, he begins to restore Christine at a local garage owned by the gruff Will Darnell, who offers Arnie a part-time job and access to parts he needs to repair Christine. Soon, Arnie develops a rebellious, arrogant personality, worrying his parents and Dennis.
Dennis confronts LeBay, who discloses that his late brother was also obsessed with Christine, that his five-year-old niece choked to death in the car, and that his sister-in-law and later his brother both committed suicide in it. At night, Dennis breaks into the garage to inspect Christine, but when Christine's radio begins playing 1950s rock and roll music, he flees.
Arnie begins a relationship with a new student, Leigh Cabot, who has rejected all her other admirers at school. While playing a football game, Dennis is stunned by the sight of Arnie and Leigh kissing in front of the now fully restored Christine, causing him to sustain a severe injury that permanently ends his football career.
One night, when Arnie and Leigh are attending a drive-in theater, Leigh expresses jealousy over Christine. While alone in the car, Leigh nearly chokes to death on a hamburger, as Christine briefly locks her doors to keep Arnie from saving her. After Arnie drives Leigh home, she vows to never get into his car again. Later that night, Buddy and his gang sneak into Darnell's garage and vandalize Christine. Arnie, enraged by the destruction, breaks up with Leigh and assaults his father when he confronts him about Christine after dinner.
The next day, Arnie returns to the garage alone and witnesses Christine repairing herself. Over two evenings, the car kills Buddy and all his gang members, blowing up a gas station in the process. Christine drives away in flames and returns to Darnell's garage, where she crushes him to death against the steering wheel. By morning, Christine is back in perfect condition when the police find Darnell's body. State Police detective Rudy Junkins questions Arnie about the death of Darnell and one of Buddy's gang members, but the car's pristine condition and Arnie's alibi convince the detective he was not involved.
Leigh and Dennis conclude that Christine is responsible for Arnie's downward spiral. They plan to lure Christine to Darnell's garage and smash her with a bulldozer, but Christine surprises them by emerging from a pile of scrap metal. Leigh flees on foot while Dennis battles Christine with the bulldozer. Arnie is now driving Christine, and in an attempt to run Leigh down, Christine crashes into Darnell's office. Arnie is thrown through the windshield and impaled on a shard of glass. He reaches out to touch Christine's grille one last time, and Christine responds by playing "Pledging My Love" by Johnny Ace on her radio as Arnie dies.
Christine continues to attack, until Dennis and Leigh corner her and flatten her with the bulldozer. The following day, Dennis, Leigh, and Junkins watch as the remains of Christine are crushed into a cube at a junkyard. Junkins congratulates the pair for stopping Christine, but they regret being unable to save Arnie. The sound of a 1950s rock and roll song spooks them briefly, but it proves to be coming from a boombox carried by a junkyard worker. Unbeknownst to them, Christine's grille twitches slightly.
Producer Richard Kobritz had previously produced the 1979 miniseriesSalem's Lot, also based on a Stephen King novel. Through producing the miniseries, Kobritz became acquainted with King, who sent him manuscripts of two of his novels, Cujo, and Christine.[4] Kobritz purchased the rights to Christine after finding himself attracted to the novel's "celebration of America's obsession with the motorcar."[4]
Kobritz's first choice for director was John Carpenter, who was initially unavailable owing to two projects: an adaptation of another King novel, Firestarter, and an adaptation of the 1980 Eric Van Lustbader novel The Ninja. However, production delays on these projects allowed Carpenter to accept the director position for Christine.[5] Kobritz and Carpenter had previously collaborated in the 1978 television filmSomeone's Watching Me!.[5] Bill Phillips was Carpenter's choice for writer and was brought on shortly after Carpenter arrived. Carpenter was also joined by special effects supervisor Roy Arbogast, who had previously worked with Carpenter in The Thing (1982).[5] According to Carpenter, Christine was not a film he had planned on directing, saying that he directed the film as "a job" as opposed to a "personal project."[6] He had previously directed The Thing, which had done poorly at the box office and led to critical backlash.[4] In retrospect, Carpenter stated that upon reading Christine, he felt that "It just wasn't very frightening. But it was something I needed to do at that time for my career."[6]
King's novel, the source material for Carpenter's film, made it clear that the car was possessed by the evil spirit of its previous owner, Roland D. LeBay, whereas the film version of the story shows that the evil spirit of the car manifested itself on the day it was built.[7] Other elements from the novel were altered for the film, particularly the execution of the death scenes, which the filmmakers opted for a more "cinematic approach."[8]
Casting
Initially, Columbia Pictures had wanted to cast Brooke Shields in the role of Leigh because of her publicity after the release of The Blue Lagoon (1981), and Scott Baio as Arnie.[4] The filmmakers declined the suggestion, opting to cast young actors who were still fairly unknown. Kevin Bacon auditioned for the role, but opted out when offered the lead in Footloose (1984).[4] Carpenter cast Keith Gordon in the role of Arnie after an audition in New York City; Gordon had some experience in film, notably in Jaws 2, and was also working in theater at the time; John Stockwell was cast at an audition in Los Angeles.[4]
Nineteen-year-old Alexandra Paul was cast in the film after an audition in New York City; according to Carpenter, Paul was an "untrained, young actress" at the time, but brought a "great quality" about the character of Leigh.[4] According to Paul, she had not read any of King's books or seen Carpenter's films, and read the novel in preparation.[4]
Filming
Christine was shot largely in Los Angeles, California, while the location for Darnell's garage was located in Santa Clarita.[8] Filming began in April 1983, mere days after the King novel had been published.[9] An abandoned furniture factory in Irwindale was used for the opening scene. The film's stunts were primarily completed by stunt coordinator Terry Leonard, who was behind the wheel of the car during the high-speed chase scenes, as well as the scene in which the car drives down a highway engulfed in flames.[8] During that scene, Leonard wore a Nomex firefighter's suit complete with breathing apparatus.
Alexandra Paul's identical twin sister Caroline Paul wrote that she and her sister pulled a prank during filming, sending Caroline on set in place of Alexandra without telling Carpenter that they had made the switch until after he had shot a scene. She wrote, "My highly skilled clutch-pushing actually made it into the movie."[10]
The car
One of the two remaining models of Christine used in the film
Although the car in the film is identified as a 1958 Plymouth Fury[11] – and in 1983 radio ads promoting the film, voiceover artists announced, "she's a '57 Fury" – two other Plymouth models, the Belvedere and the Savoy, were also used to portray the malevolent automobile onscreen. John Carpenter placed ads throughout Southern California searching for models of the car, and was able to purchase twenty-four of them in various states of disrepair, which were used to build a total of seventeen copies of the film car.[9] All cars were two door hardtops.
Total production for the 1958 Plymouth Fury was only 5,303, and they were difficult to find and expensive to buy at the time. In addition, the real-life Furys only came in one color, "Sandstone White" with a "Buckskin Beige" interior, seen on the other Furys on the assembly line during the initial scenes of the movie, though the car in King's novel was ordered with a red-and-white custom paint job.[12]
Originally, Carpenter had not planned to film the car's regeneration scenes, but gave special effects supervisor Roy Arbogast three weeks to devise a way for the car to rebuild itself. Arbogast and his team made rubber molds from one of the cars, including a whole front end. One of the cars was stripped of its engine to accommodate internally-mounted hydraulics that pulled the framework inward, crumpling the car, with the shot then run backwards in the final film.[8] Twenty-three cars were used in the film.[1] Initially sold as scrap metal after filming ended, one of the best known surviving vehicles was eventually rescued from the junkyard and restored. It was subsequently bought by collector Bill Gibson of Pensacola, Florida.[13] One of the Christines was auctioned off at an auto-auction in Florida in January 2020.[14][15]
Release
Box office
Christine was released in North America on December 9, 1983, to 1,045 theaters.[16] In its opening weekend Christine brought in $3,408,904 landing at #4. The film dropped 39.6% in its second weekend, grossing $2,058,517 slipping from fourth to eighth place. In its third weekend, it grossed $1,851,909 dropping to #9. The film remained at #9 its fourth weekend, grossing $2,736,782. In its fifth weekend, it returned to #8, grossing $2,015,922. Bringing in $1,316,835 in its sixth weekend, the film dropped out of the box office top ten to twelfth place. In its seventh and final weekend, the film brought in $819,972 landing at #14, bringing the total gross for Christine to $21,017,849.[2]
Critical response
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, Christine holds a 72% approval rating based on 39 reviews, with an average rating of 6.1/10. The consensus reads: "The cracks are starting to show in John Carpenter's directorial instincts, but Christine is nonetheless silly, zippy fun.”[17]
Roger Ebert gave the movie three out of four stars, saying: "By the end of the movie, Christine has developed such a formidable personality that we are actually taking sides during its duel with a bulldozer. This is the kind of movie where you walk out with a silly grin, get in your car, and lay rubber halfway down the Eisenhower."[18]Janet Maslin of The New York Times gave the film a middling review, saying: "The early parts of the film are engaging and well acted, creating a believable high-school atmosphere. Unfortunately, the later part of the film is slow in developing, and it unfolds in predictable ways."[19]Variety gave the film a negative review, stating: "Christine seems like a retread. This time it's a fire-engine red, 1958 Plymouth Fury that's possessed by the Devil, and this deja-vu premise [from the novel by Stephen King] combined with the crazed-vehicle format, makes Christine appear pretty shop worn."[20]Time Out said of the film: "Carpenter and novelist Stephen King share not merely a taste for genre horror but a love of '50's teenage culture; and although set in the present, Christine reflects the second taste far more effectively than the first."[21] In 2023, John Carpenter reflected on the movie:
“I love my cast in that movie. Keith Gordon was fabulous, and Alexandra Paul was… I believe she’d been a model, and she’s just a terrific actress. And the great character actor Harry Dean Stanton was on that. Harry Dean is quite a character, I really loved him. But it was a fun movie to make and easy — nothing tough about it. And it did OK, you know, it opened alright. So people were kind, which is nice.“[22]
King's reaction
While he was promoting the film adaptation of Dreamcatcher in 2003, Stephen King mentioned Christine as one of two film adaptations of his work that had "bored" him, stating:
I may just be the most adapted novelist in modern times... and I don't say that with pride so much as with a kind of stunned bemusement. Several honorable adaptations have come from this thirty-year spew of celluloid... and the best of those have had few of the elements I'm best known for: science fiction, fantasy, the supernatural, and pure gross-out moments... The books that do have those elements have, by and large, become films that are either forgettable or outright embarrassing. Others—I'm thinking chiefly of Christine and Stanley Kubrick's take on The Shining—should have been good but just... well, they just aren't. They're actually sort of boring. Speaking for myself, I'd rather have bad than boring.[23]
Home media
The film was released on VHS by Columbia Pictures, and on DVD on August 4, 1998, and re-released on DVD in 2004.[24] On March 12, 2013, Twilight Time video released the film on Blu-ray for the first time in a limited edition run numbered at 3,000 copies.[25] On September 29, 2015, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment re-released the film on Blu-ray.[26] The film was released on 4K UHD Blu-ray on September 11, 2018.[27]
Soundtrack
Two soundtracks were released, one consisting purely of the music written and composed by John Carpenter and Alan Howarth, the other consisting of the contemporary pop songs used in the film.[28]
The soundtrack album containing songs used in the film was entitled Christine: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack and was released on LP and cassette on Motown Records.[29] It contained 10 (of the 15) songs listed in the film's credits, plus one track from John Carpenter and Alan Howarth's own score. The track listing was as follows:
^Liebman, Mark (September 28, 2015). "Christine Blu-ray". Blu-ray.com. Archived from the original on November 27, 2015. Retrieved November 28, 2015.
^Duarte, M. Enois (September 5, 2018). "Christine – 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray". ultrahd.highdefdigest.com. Archived from the original on June 12, 2018. Retrieved June 12, 2018.
Benjaminson, James (1994). Plymouth, 1946–1959. Motorbooks International. ISBN978-0-87938-840-9.
Von Doviak, Scott (2014). Stephen King Films FAQ: All That's Left to Know About the King of Horror on Film. Applause Theatre & Cinema. ISBN978-1-48035-551-4.
