Strange that the discussion of locomotive vs. truck horsepower and trucks posing as trains … and the kitbashing of what are essentially 1:1 operating train models … was interrupted only shortly after the ‘behind the scenes’ video links were provided.
I think the discussions of the technique are interesting in a ‘modeling’ context, albeit a somewhat unusual one, and that includes the use of Freightliner truck power [(-D]
This might make an amusing vignette to model: 1:87 filmmakers attaching plastic truck frames and kludging up single-truck power and whole dummy locomotives… as regular powered/dummy locomotive consists with plastic sideframes roll by…
Kalmbach is having a field day delaying, losing, and doubling up posts today. Note the submission times of what were my multiple ‘identical’ posts – that’s no buffer delay!
Their advertising has apparently frozen my browser trying to load itself now, so it’s back to the phone.
I have not yet seen the second YouTube video that was posted, about shooting the infamous ‘up on six wheels’ curve shot. I simply assumed it was just overdone CGI… but considering the work they did in prep for the derailment scene, it could be interesting.
From a modeling rather than a railroading perspective, of course. Wouldn’t want to veer off topic in this thread, as it were, would we?
Even as a youngster, seeing The Train wreck scenes, at that time on the “big screen” was sure impressive.
I do recall reading about the filming of The Greatest Show On Earth and discovering that those wreck scenes were filmed using roughly 1½" scale equipment.
No, on second thought, I’m confusing Greatest Show with an older B&W movie about a circus train wreck. I’ll have to dust off more brain cells.
Years later I remember seeing the photos of the big MGM auction and those Inch-and-a-half cars were shown in the warehouse.
As far as trucks posing as trains, I recall that in the movie “A Christmas Story” there’s a part where the family goes ‘downtown’ to the department store to see Santa. Mixed in with the c.1936 vehicles when they’re outside the store is a streetcar rolling by - however, it was actually a dummy body built over an automobile. Streetcars on that street had last run maybe 30 years before and all the tracks and wires were long gone. They shot it in such a way that you can’t see the streetcar’s trucks (or lack thereof).
Many years ago I was given the left over parts from a major films model train that was to be wreaked. This was done in a smaller scale and the front of the steam engine was remade from alluminum foil so that it would crush on impact.
I’d swear that black-and-white movie was from 1936 (or so) and that someone posted a video link of its wreck scene in one of the Kalmbach forums… and not too long ago, either.
No where in A Christmas Story does it specify a year.
If you watch the movie with the audio commentary on, the director says he was going for a look of the late 30s to early 40s.
The author, Jean Shepherd, was actually in the second grade in the late 1920s.
If you want to geek out… no new cars are shown in the film, all the cars have wear on them. The best looking vehicle we see is a taxi cab from the late 1930s. The Red Ryder ad Ralphie hides under his bed is from 1937. The Little Orphan Annie decoder ring is from 1940, but similar rings date to 1935. The Parker family car is a 1938 Oldsmobile that is in worn shape, suggesting that WW2 shortages are in effect.
No one in the film mentions the going-ons in Europe in the late 1930s or early 1940s.
I would love a Lionel train guy to date the models on display in the window at Higbee’s Department Store.
And that’s the era that I was guessing, Kevin, just from the cars, cast dress, and radio program. So, if CRC was around till '42 then the trolley wouldn’t be an anachronym…???
No bother. It’s still an enjoyable classic movie. And the house they used for the exterior shots is only a 20 min drive from me.
I would have to research exact dates but I believe some were pressed into service in peak times into the 1950s to supplement the PCCs. I have a 1959 photo of a train of four 1914 Kuhlman cars still running on the Shaker/Van Aken line.
Of course a few were still run for special excursion use at least into the late 1970s.
But, the Wizard of Oz characters at Higbee’s are clearly the 1939 movie versions of the characters. Between the Wizard of Oz and the decoder ring, it has to be either 1939 or 1940.
Easier than that… if you know your Stephen Sieninger.
The Red Ryder strip that started the whole franchise didn’t appear until November 1938… and even with coordinated marketing wouldn’t have been ‘famous’ as a must-have Christmas thing that year, the year the Depression tried clamping down again. (I have no idea how Ralphie accessed an alternate time continuum in which he had a published Red Ryder ‘anything’ from 1937.) The Republic serial didn’t start until late June 1940; the first comic-book wasn’t until September 1940; most tellingly, the Daisy Red Ryder gun wasn’t marketed as such until spring 1940.
Meanwhile Christmas season 1941 would… well, let’s say December 7th wouldn’t have gone unremarked, to amplify the point Kevin made.
So it’s pretty clear circumstantially what Christmas we’d be looking at…
Re “A Christmas Story”, the street scenes were filmed in Cleveland, but the movie was set in “Holman Indiana” which was Jean Shepherd’s fictionalized version of his hometown of Hammond, IN, just across the border from Chicago (remember Dad reading the newspaper story about the upcoming Bears game?). IIRC Shepherd grew up on Holman Ave. in Hammond.
I agree the movie doesn’t appear to be set in one particular year. Shepherd was born in 1921 so would have been Ralphie’s age (about 10-12?) in the early 1930’s, but as noted there are details that would indicate it was a later time. BTW the “Little Orphan Annie” radio show was on the air starting in 1930 on WGN in Chicago, then went national on NBC’s Blue Network 1931-42.
Keep in mind there were hundreds of stories Shepherd did about Ralphie and his exploits, including dating and serving in World War II. Some were stories he told on his radio show, some were published short stories (many published in Playboy). About a half-dozen were made into TV programs / movies for PBS in the 1970’s-80’s. Those PBS presentations had Ralph being a teenager in the 1950’s.
I recall the department store trains included a c.1935 Lionel semi-scale Hiawatha set. (It was built to ‘true’ O scale of 1:43, but had detailing more like a tinplate train.)
Back to Cleveland, I understand someone bought the house used for the exterior shots and rebuilt the interior so the layout and decoration of the rooms were a duplicate of the movie sets (including the iconic lamp) so people could come and tour it.
I don’t think anybody said it was. Stix’s comment was that streetcars hadn’t run on that street in 30 years when the movie was filmed, not in 30 years before it supposedly took place. That’s why they had to use a dummy over an automobile body - when they were filming there were no tracks for the streecar to run on.
