SKS watch along: CHRISTINE Christine (1983) Info + Zoom Link

Let’s kick off Stephen King Summer with this cult classic

We’re kicking off Stephen King Summer 2025 with a movie watch-along of the 1983 version of Christine.

Christine (titled onscreen as John Carpenter's Christine) is a 1983 American supernatural horror film co-scored and directed by John Carpenter and starring Keith Gordon, John Stockwell, Alexandra Paul, Robert Prosky and Harry Dean Stanton, with Roberts Blossom and Kelly Preston.

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.

Initially, Columbia Pictures wanted to cast Brooke Shields in the role of Leigh because of her publicity after the release of The Blue Lagoon, and Scott Baio as Arnie. 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. 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. 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. According to Paul, she had not read any of King's books or seen Carpenter's films, and read the novel in preparation.

Although the car in the film is identified as a 1958 Plymouth Fury – 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. All cars were two door hardtops.

On Rotten Tomatoes Christine holds a 73% approval rating based on 40 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."

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.”

Christine is rated R and is available to rent at Amazon, Apple TV, Fandango at Home and the Microsoft Store. If you want to watch along with us, please make sure you are using an ad-free version so that you don’t get behind from the rest of us as we all hit play together! Its runtime is about 1 hour 50 minutes.

We will be meeting on Sunday, June 1 at 4pm PT/7pm ET to watch Christine together! This is a really fun way to do it. We hop on zoom, chat for a few minutes, mute ourselves and then press play at the same time. The chat is always hopping with funny quips and it’s hilarious to see our faces react to the scary parts. Secret Stuff movie watch-alongs are the only way I watch Stephen King adaptations :) 

(Zoom info below)

Can’t wait to see you all there and kick off another Stephen King Summer!

Cheers,

Colleen (and Laura)