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Melinda Dillon, who received supporting Oscar nominations for her turns in Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Absence of Malice and portrayed the doting mom in the holiday perennial A Christmas Story, died Jan. 9, her family announced. She was 83. In Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), Dillon portrayed Jillian Guiler, the single mother who heads to Devils Tower with her next-door neighbor (Richard Dreyfuss) in search of her 3-year-old son, who’s been abducted by aliens through the kitchen doggy door. Sydney Pollack’s Absence of Malice (1981) had her back with Slap Shot co-star Paul...

Peter Billingsley, who starred as Ralphie Parker in A Christmas Story when he was only 12, will be returning to lead a sequel to the perennial holiday favorite. The 50-year-old child star–turned–filmmaker will be reprising his role in the new film, which is expected to take place when Ralphie is an adult in the 1970s, The Hollywood Reporter revealed on Thursday. In addition to starring in the sequel to the 1983 classic — titled A Christmas Story Christmas — Billingsley will produce for its production companies Legendary and Warner Bros. The Christmas Chronicles director Clay Kaytis is attached to direct...

In the 36-years since Bob Clark’s A Christmas Story first appeared on the big screen, the movie has become as much a part of the Christmas season as Santa himself. More than just a charming holiday movie, A Christmas Story captures a time in America where kids could be kids; free to roam, daydream, tussle, and yes, even nearly lose an eye, without them (or their parents) being thrown into handcuffs or hauled in front of a family court magistrate. But no longer. Today’s child-rearing environment, dominated by a combination of helicopter parents and overzealous nanny staters, allows no such...

By the early 1980s, Shep’s radio show was over. This movie idea was his last chance to avoid the poorhouse. Shep, Leigh and Clark collaborated on the screenplay, and she helped keep Shep off Clark’s set. Shep, who considered himself a co-director, was constantly “helping the actors” and haranguing visitors, most of whom had never heard of him. Shep was no longer a has-been. Like “the Old Man” he had finally won his own “major award.” And no one could steal this idea. Shep’s late-in-life success had been created out of the magical world of his own childhood, one he...

An illegal alien suspected of causing a traffic accident and killing movie director Bob Clark, whose "A Christmas Story" has come alongside "It's a Wonderful Life" and "Miracle on 34th Street" as a perennial holiday must-watch, has been placed under an immigration hold by federal authorities. The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency placed the hold on Hector Velazquez-Nava, 24, a Mexican national who was living in Los Angeles as an illegal immigrant, according to a report from Americans for Legal Immigration Political Action Committee. Agency spokeswoman Virginia Kice said the hold means Valezquez-Nava, when his Los Angeles court proceedings...

The A Christmas Story House and Museum is not the only way fans can celebrate the film's legacy in Cleveland. Read on for a guide to all things "A Christmas Story"– just don't shoot your eye out. A Christmas Story House and Museum: Open seven days a week, year-round, at 3159 West 11th St. in Cleveland's Tremont neighborhood. Call 216-298-4919 or email info@achristmasstoryhouse.com. Hours: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday through Saturday, and noon-5 p.m. Sunday. Tours of the house run every 30 minutes. Regular admission is $10 for adults, $8 for seniors, $6 for children (ages 7 to 12) and free...

CLEVELAND (AP) - Even after three decades, the triple-dog dare doesn't get old. The film "A Christmas Story" opened 30 years ago to mixed reviews but has shown its staying power as a holiday family favorite. Cleveland, where parts of the movie were filmed and hard-luck Ralphie dreamed big, is celebrating the anniversary with iconic leg lamps, holiday store windows like the ones that drew Ralphie's wide-eyed stares and stage and musical versions of "A Christmas Story." "It becomes part of your fabric for your whole life," said Kevin Moore, managing director of the Cleveland Play House, where the stage...

Dad says Facebook photo of son with gun brought cops to house A New Jersey man says that, on the basis of mere hearsay about a Facebook photo of his 11-year-old son with a .22 rifle, police and child protection arrive at his door and demand entry. I am sure there are several 11-year-old boys who are terribly proficient at handling a gun. But, given that I wouldn't trust an 11-year-old boy with a popsicle, I would just as well not be anywhere near them. This, however, doesn't appear to have been the policy of the authorities in New Jersey....

'A Christmas Story' It wouldn't be Christmas without 'A Christmas Story,' the 1983 movie that became an instant holiday classic thanks to its winning cast and quotable scenes. The film is as time-honored a tradition as getting your tongue stuck to a pole in freezing weather. Here's a then-and-now look at the gang from fictional Hohman, Indiana, who brought the 'original, traditional, one-hundred-percent, red-blooded, two-fisted, all-American Christmas' tale to life ...

"The old man could replace a fuse quicker than a jackrabbit on a date." Discuss.

It wouldn't be Christmas without 'A Christmas Story,' the 1983 movie that became an instant holiday classic thanks to its winning cast and quotable scenes. The film is as time-honored a tradition as getting your tongue stuck to a pole in freezing weather. Here's a then-and-now look at the gang from fictional Hohman, Indiana, who brought the 'original, traditional, one-hundred-percent, red-blooded, two-fisted, all-American Christmas' tale to life ...

Set in the 1940s, "A Christmas Story" depicts a series of family vignettes through the eyes of 9-year-old Ralphie Parker, who yearns for that gift of all gifts: the Daisy Red Ryder BB gun. This was boyhood before "bang-bang you're dead" was banned. Family life prior to "One Dad, Two Dads, Brown Dad, Blue Dads," and Christmas without the ACLU. If children could choose their families, most would opt for the kind depicted in this film, where mother is a homemaker, father is a regular working stiff, and between them they have zero repertoire of psychobabble to rub together. Although...

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When asked for comment, BHO replied "It's a major award!"

Curiosity about the behind-the-scenes stories and locations where director Bob Clark shot his cult holiday classic 'A Christmas Story' has inspired a documentary by two diehard fans of the film. Tyler Schwartz and Jordie Smits spent the past two years researching, interviewing and filming the documentary Road Trip for Ralphie, a chronicle of their travel to the film's locations. Filmed in Ohio and in Ontario, the 1983 original continues to appeal to audiences today. "It's so funny. It's so down to earth," Smits told CBC News on Tuesday morning. "It's a real story about a family at Christmas time. It's...

"It wouldn't be Christmas without 'A Christmas Story,' the 1983 movie that became an instant holiday classic thanks to its winning cast and quotable scenes. Here's a then-and-now look at the gang from fictional Hohman, Indiana, who brought the 'original, traditional, one-hundred-percent, red-blooded, two-fisted, all-American Christmas' tale to life."

Fans of the holiday classic “A Christmas Story” are celebrating the film’s 25th anniversary with a convention and trips to the house where the movie was made. The 1983 film, an adaptation of Jean Shepard’s memoir of a boy in the 1940s, was set in Indiana but largely filmed in Ohio. The movie starred Peter Billingsley as Ralphie Parker, a young boy determined to get a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas. The film was a modest theatrical success, but critics loved it. It eventually joined “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “Miracle on 34th Street” as a Christmas classic. “It’s...

The TBS channel is currently airing their 24 hour marathon of the Christmas classic: A Christmas Story.

A man convicted of causing a crash on Pacific Coast Highway that killed the director of "A Christmas Story'' and his son is scheduled to be sentenced today. Hector Manuel Velazquez-Nava faces a six-year state prison term. Velazquez-Nava pleaded no contest to two counts of manslaughter in August in the deaths of Robert Clark and his son, Ariel Hanrath-Clark. Authorities said Velazquez-Nava, an illegal immigrant, had a blood-alcohol content of .24 -- three times the legal limit.

<p>A man who caused a crash on Pacific Coast Highway that killed the director of ''A Christmas Story'' and his son pleaded no contest Wednesday to gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated.</p> <p>Hector Manuel Velazquez-Nava, 24, faces a six-year state prison term when sentenced Sept. 27 at the Airport Branch Courthouse, according to the District Attorney's Office.</p>