Christine (1983)

A nerdish boy buys a strange car with an evil mind of its own and his nature starts to change to reflect it.

Director:

John Carpenter

Writers:

Stephen King (novel), Bill Phillips (screenplay)

Stars:

Keith Gordon, John Stockwell, Alexandra Paul

2 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Keith Gordon	...	Arnie Cunningham
John Stockwell	...	Dennis Guilder
Alexandra Paul	...	Leigh Cabot
Robert Prosky	...	Will Darnell
Harry Dean Stanton	...	Detective Rudolph Junkins
Christine Belford	...	Regina Cunningham
Roberts Blossom	...	George LeBay
William Ostrander	...	Buddy Repperton
David Spielberg	...	Mr. Casey
Malcolm Danare	...	Moochie
Steven Tash	...	Rich
Stuart Charno	...	Don Vandenberg
Kelly Preston	...	Roseanne
Marc Poppel	...	Chuck
Robert Darnell	...	Michael Cunningham

Storyline

In 1957, in Detroit, a red Plymouth Fury is built and is the cause of two accidents, one of them fatal, still in the assembly line. Twenty-one years later, the outcast and bullied nerd Arnold "Arnie" Cunningham is getting a ride with his best and only friend Dennis Guilder and he sees the wrecked car for sale in a garden. Arnie immediately falls in love with the car. The car was given the name Christine by its first owner. He brings the car to a repair shop of the despicable Will Darnell and works hard to restore the classic car. While he works in the restoration, he changes his personality to a cocky teenager and he dates the most beautiful girl in the high-school, Leigh Cabot. Soon Arnie becomes selfish and jealous of the supernatural Christine that kills everyone that is a threat to them.

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Plot Keywords:

killer car | year 1978 | year 1957 | friendship | darkness | 

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Taglines:

She was born bad. Plain and simple. Somewhere deep on a darkened assembly line. Christine. A '58 Plymouth Fury possessed by Hell. She's taken control of her teenage owner, Arnie. Her previous owner is not alive to warn him. And now she's steering straight for the one person in her way. Arnie's girlfriend, Leigh. The other woman.

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Genres:

Horror

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

9 December 1983 (USA)

Also Known As:

John Carpenter's Christine

Filming Locations:

Pickwick Drive-In Theater - 1100 W. Alameda Avenue, Burbank, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$9,700,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$3,408,000, 11 December 1983, Wide Release

Gross USA:

$21,200,000

Company Credits

Production Co:

Columbia Pictures Corporation, Delphi Premier Productions, Polar Film

Technical Specs

Runtime:

110 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Stereo

Color:

Color (Metrocolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

According to Bill Phillips in the DVD Documentary, Robert Prosky (Will Darnell) asked Phillips to give him more dialog to make his character more interesting. Prosky cited the scene in the novel where Darnell offers Arnie a job, particularly the line: "You can pick up around the place. Do a few lubes. And put the toilet paper on the spools..." So Phillips added the scene to the script, keeping the dialogue almost verbatim from the novel.

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Goofs

On Thanksgiving Day, November 23, 1978, we see the Oakland Raiders playing a football game on the television set in Dennis's hospital room. In reality, the Raiders did not play on that day. The two NFL games that were played that day were: Denver Broncos vs. Detroit Lions and Washington Redskins vs. Dallas Cowboys.

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Quotes

Rudolph Junkins: The kid was cut in half Arnie, they had to scrape his legs up with a shovel.
Arnie Cunningham: Well, isn't that what you're supposed to do with shit? Scrape it up with a little shovel?
Rudolph Junkins: Don't get smart with me, son. Your girlfriend is a hell of a lot more convincing than you are.
Arnie Cunningham: [laughs] She's not my girlfriend. And since when is it against the law to fix up your own car when somebody else busts it up, huh?
Rudolph Junkins: ...since never.
Arnie Cunningham: Then you get off my back.
Rudolph Junkins: [pause] Okay.
[...]

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Crazy Credits

In the opening credits when the titles are appearing, Christine's engine can be heard.

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Alternate Versions

CBS edited 15 minutes from this film for its 1987 network television premiere.

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Connections

Referenced in Star Trek: Voyager: Alice (1999)

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Soundtracks

We Belong Together
Written by Robert Carr, Johnny Mitchell and Hy Weiss
Performed by Robert & Johnny
Courtesy of Old Town Records
Big Seven Music Corp. & Maureen Music, Inc.

User Reviews

Don't Mess With Christine!

I'm not particularly a fan of horror movies and I couldn't fix an ailing automobile if my life depended on it so the workings of cars don't fascinate me.....but this movie fascinated me. The '58 Plymouth Fury, alias "Christine," is absolutely gorgeous. What a piece of machinery!

This is a horror story but there are no ghosts or monsters nor is there any gore. A car is the star of the film, a very jealous and vengeful one at that. Man, that sounds silly but, if you're reading this you have probably watched the movie so no sense going into details. It's hard to describe the story in a paragraph without it sounding stupid....but it's not. Maybe the quickest way to explain it is that it is about a car that is alive, like a human, and you mess with it, you pay!

It is definitely one creepy, well-made, unique and always-entertaining film.

The car is a lot better than any of the people, sad to say. No, I didn't like any of the kids in this film (high schoolers who all look 30 years old!) and the language is a little too rough in spots, but that can be filtered out.

The car, the '50s music, the unique story, the satisfying revenge angle all make this very watchable.