8.1 | / 10 |
Users | 4.2 | |
Reviewer | 4.5 | |
Overall | 4.2 |
Set in a 1940s-era Midwestern town and told from the viewpoints of a seven-year-old boy, who only wants one thing for Christmas — a Red Ryder BB gun — the episodic tale chronicles not only his schemes to convince his mother and father to buy him one, but also offers a warmly nostalgic look into 1940s middle-class American life. From the stories of, and narrated by, Jean Shepherd.
Starring: Melinda Dillon, Darren McGavin, Peter Billingsley, Ian Petrella, Scott SchwartzFamily | 100% |
Comedy | 92% |
Holiday | 55% |
Period | 5% |
Video codec: HEVC / H.265
Video resolution: 4K (2160p)
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono (48kHz, 24-bit)
French: Dolby Digital Mono
Spanish: Dolby Digital Mono
English SDH, French, Spanish, Dutch
Blu-ray Disc
Two-disc set (2 BDs)
Digital copy
4K Ultra HD
Slipcover in original pressing
Region free
Movie | 5.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 3.5 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
Fast approaching its 40th birthday, Bob Clark's A Christmas Story is, in this reviewer's opinion, one of the proverbial 800-lb. gorillas of holiday entertainment, a perpetually watchable and endlessly enjoyable slice of Americana that blurs the line between nostalgic attachment and great filmmaking. How do you even critique this thing? We all know it by heart, whether through worn-out VHS tapes growing up, TBS' annual 24-hour marathon (a Christmas tradition since 1997), DVD, Blu-ray, or all of the above. You can now add 4K to that list: Warner Bros. has finally, finally dragged this film into the 21st century with a terrific new master that makes it shine like a brand-new Red Ryder.
A modest hit in theaters upon its November 1983 release, A Christmas Story established its current long-standing legacy through endless TV broadcasts and robust VHS/DVD sales so, unsurprisingly, we've been conditioned to think it just isn't supposed to look all that pretty. But while it thankfully preserves the film's intentionally gauzy aesthetic that mimics its nostalgic 1940s setting, Warner Bros.' new 4K master of A Christmas Story passes the "wow factor" test with flying colors as its clean, stable, and film-like appearance will make die-hard fans feel like they're watching it for the first time. Depth, fine detail, color saturation, black levels, and just about everything else is improved here, thanks of course to a fresh new scan of its unspecified source material (the original negative, surely?) and substantially better encoding technology -- the best this film got on home video until now was a VC-1-encoded DVD-era master squeezed onto a single-layered Blu-ray. When applied to a disc with nearly triple the real estate, this 2160p, HDR10-enhanced transfer simply has all the room in the world to breathe and the results are unsurprisingly spectacular.
Fundamentally, the nuts and bolts of 4K -- disc space, encoding, resolution -- provide the biggest visual boosts for A Christmas Story this time around, although the HDR10 metadata layer certainly adds a few attractive but authentic visual flourishes that won't go unnoticed. Holiday lights, bright primaries, the colorful classroom setting, Santa's North Pole display at the department store, wrapped Christmas gifts; these highlights and more are given new life thanks to noticeably cleaner color saturation, which also extends to deeper black levels and brighter whites, neither of which falls victim to crush or blooming. A Christmas Story's intentionally filtered appearance is preserved and improved thanks to much more dialed-in contrast levels that, on lesser formats, reduced the light film grain and fine gradients to a mushy, noisy mess. Any softness or other hiccups that remains are likely baked in to the source material.
As mentioned earlier, the included Blu-ray (which is the source for this review's screenshots) stems from the same newly-remastered image, just downsampled to 2K and without the modest benefits of HDR enhancement. Image detail, textures, black levels, and everything else meets or exceeds expectations for the format; aside from trace instances of macro blocking, this is about as perfect a standard HD release as you can get. It's a proportionately solid silver-medal winner that's still leaps and bounds above previous home video editions and, for that reason alone, makes this combo pack worth picking up for Blu-ray fans too -- sadly, this disc is not available separately, at least for now.
Considering A Christmas Story's modest source material, I wouldn't be surprised if this DTS-HD 2.0 Master Audio track sounded more or less identical to the lossless upgrade featured on -- and until now, exclusive to -- Warner Bros.' 30th Anniversary Steelbook. But I don't own that disc... and new 4K film scans frequently squeeze more juice out of audio elements too, so it's safe to say this quaint but satisfying split mono track is either tied for first or edges ahead. At the very least, it's certainly a bit more impactful than the old Dolby Digital mixes of yore with reasonably crisp audio, good overall balance, and very little straining at the high end. Under the circumstances, I doubt it'll ever sound better.
Optional subtitles, including English (SDH), are included during the main feature and applicable extras.
This two-disc release ships in a dual-hubbed keepcase with phoned-in cover artwork, a matching slipcover, and a Digital Copy redemption code. Bonus features are mostly identical to the 2006 Blu-ray (and its many variants), although two vintage supplements have been resurrected from other less common editions.
4K DISC (Movie and Bonus Feature)
BLU-RAY DISC (Movie and Bonus Features)
Bob Clark's A Christmas Story is an American tradition at this point... and if you know someone who absolutely loathes it, then you probably don't need that kind of negativity in your life. Warner Bros.' long-overdue 4K edition finally grants the film a much-needed face lift with fantastic 4K visuals and a newly-minted Blu-ray to boot. Add in the lossless audio not offered on most older Blu-ray editions and even two rescued bonus features and you've got as definitive a home video package as it's ever received. Highly Recommended, whether you're currently set up for 4K or not.
Iconic Moments
1983
Includes Ralphie In Bunny Ears Funko Pocket Pop! Keychain
1983
1983
1983
Ugly Sweater packaging
1983
Exclusive Lenticular + Postcards
1983
25th Anniversary Ultimate Collector's Edition
1983
1983
30th Anniversary Edition
1983
1983
2003
1989
Grinchmas Edition
2000
30th Anniversary Edition
1990
2007
1992
10th Anniversary
2002
2007
It Runs in My Family
1994
2012
1998
1996
2004
Anniversary Edition
1994
2006
1988
2009
2011
2006
70th Anniversary Edition
1947