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Christine the 1958 Plymouth Fury
From Film "Christine" (1983)
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About This Car
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This is a great DVD with all kinds of recent interviews with the actors and featurettes on how they did all that cool car stuff!
Christine: Now is this
movie cool, or is this movie cool? The coolest thing about this
movie, hands down, is the car itself. She's like a psychotic
Herbie the Love Bug.
If you're unfamiliar with Christine, it was a feature film in 1983 directed by legendary horror filmmaker John Carpenter and based upon the novel by Stephen King. Stephen King was so popular at this time that the movie was in production before the book was even published. I'm not too much into Stephen King's stories, but this one is very appealing. The idea of a great-looking classic car that goes around killing people and playing oldies music is a really fantastic premise one can write about in a million different directions. I thought this was well-done. I'm surprised it didn't start a craze of killer classic car movies.
The movie itself is quite good. But this page is about the car. It's unclear why Christine is an evil car with a mind of its own. Is she possessed by an evil spirit, or possibly from Hell? We're not told. We do know her abilities are beyond anyone's comprehension. We also know that she has overtaken Arnie and turned him evil.
The car can regenerate itself after being damaged and does so numerous times throughout the film. It has a preference for 1950s songs and her radio will ONLY play these oldies. It can drive on its own, and apparently it knows people by their looks. Christine kills anyone that disrespects her or interferes with her and owner Arnie. After being demolished by a ruthless gang of teenage bullies, Christine carries out a vendetta against each member...but her killing does not stop there. As Arnie deepens into madness, it's up to his one-time best friend and girlfriend to stop him AND the deadly car.
Well, Arnie gets killed by flying through the windshield with a shard of glass through his torso. After a long battle, Christine is demolished by a bulldozer and later compacted into a cube in a junkyard. But we're talking about a car that can repair itself, so is she really finished? Well, there hasn't been a follow-up film so we're assuming so. The film ends ominously, so we can only wonder.
Depending on various sources, there were 13 or 16 "Christines" destroyed in this film. There were about 25 Christine cars used in all.
The 1958 Plymouth Fury is very similar to the 1957 Plymouth Belvedere. Pretty much when the Fury name was introduced, it was a sport and trim package on the Belvedere. So actually, the cars used in the film are a combination of Furys and Belvederes.
The 1958 Plymouth Fury cars were quite rare to find even back in 1983. Many Plymouth enthusiasts were pretty ticked off to see this many of the classic cars demolished. However, this movie repopularized the car and helped save many of them. It's funny how something like a movie can affect a person's attitude towards collecting and customizing a car. This same thing can be evidenced with the DeLorean in the "Back to the Future" film of 1985.
At the time the 1958 Plymouth Fury was produced, they were all buckskin beige in color. Stephen King's book explains this car was custom ordered in Ford red. You may notice at the beginning how Christine was the only car on the line that wasn't beige.
In the original Stephen King book "Christine", the car was a 4-door. This was a big oopsie. There was never a 4-door 1958 Plymouth Fury. In the movie, it HAD to be changed to a two-door.
The car that Harry Dean Stanton's character Detective Junkins drives is a 1978 Plymouth Fury. Many policemen of the late 1970s drove Plymouth Furys.
How did the car regenerate itself? Christine would probably like to think that she did it all herself, but the special effects guys did give her a bit of help. Here's how they did it:
The scene where Christine completely repairs herself after being smashed by Buddy's gang, and Arnie looks on, having completely lost his mind.
Christine smashes her fenders as she pursues Moochie down a narrow alley.
The entire Buddy Reperton chase scene, notably:
Christine continually trying to rebuild herself as Dennis and Leigh run over her with the bulldozer.
Finally seeing Christine compressed into a cube.
Stats:
Photos:
If you're unfamiliar with Christine, it was a feature film in 1983 directed by legendary horror filmmaker John Carpenter and based upon the novel by Stephen King. Stephen King was so popular at this time that the movie was in production before the book was even published. I'm not too much into Stephen King's stories, but this one is very appealing. The idea of a great-looking classic car that goes around killing people and playing oldies music is a really fantastic premise one can write about in a million different directions. I thought this was well-done. I'm surprised it didn't start a craze of killer classic car movies.
The movie itself is quite good. But this page is about the car. It's unclear why Christine is an evil car with a mind of its own. Is she possessed by an evil spirit, or possibly from Hell? We're not told. We do know her abilities are beyond anyone's comprehension. We also know that she has overtaken Arnie and turned him evil.
The car can regenerate itself after being damaged and does so numerous times throughout the film. It has a preference for 1950s songs and her radio will ONLY play these oldies. It can drive on its own, and apparently it knows people by their looks. Christine kills anyone that disrespects her or interferes with her and owner Arnie. After being demolished by a ruthless gang of teenage bullies, Christine carries out a vendetta against each member...but her killing does not stop there. As Arnie deepens into madness, it's up to his one-time best friend and girlfriend to stop him AND the deadly car.
Well, Arnie gets killed by flying through the windshield with a shard of glass through his torso. After a long battle, Christine is demolished by a bulldozer and later compacted into a cube in a junkyard. But we're talking about a car that can repair itself, so is she really finished? Well, there hasn't been a follow-up film so we're assuming so. The film ends ominously, so we can only wonder.
"Christine"
Car Facts:
Depending on various sources, there were 13 or 16 "Christines" destroyed in this film. There were about 25 Christine cars used in all.
The 1958 Plymouth Fury is very similar to the 1957 Plymouth Belvedere. Pretty much when the Fury name was introduced, it was a sport and trim package on the Belvedere. So actually, the cars used in the film are a combination of Furys and Belvederes.
The 1958 Plymouth Fury cars were quite rare to find even back in 1983. Many Plymouth enthusiasts were pretty ticked off to see this many of the classic cars demolished. However, this movie repopularized the car and helped save many of them. It's funny how something like a movie can affect a person's attitude towards collecting and customizing a car. This same thing can be evidenced with the DeLorean in the "Back to the Future" film of 1985.
At the time the 1958 Plymouth Fury was produced, they were all buckskin beige in color. Stephen King's book explains this car was custom ordered in Ford red. You may notice at the beginning how Christine was the only car on the line that wasn't beige.
In the original Stephen King book "Christine", the car was a 4-door. This was a big oopsie. There was never a 4-door 1958 Plymouth Fury. In the movie, it HAD to be changed to a two-door.
The car that Harry Dean Stanton's character Detective Junkins drives is a 1978 Plymouth Fury. Many policemen of the late 1970s drove Plymouth Furys.
How did the car regenerate itself? Christine would probably like to think that she did it all herself, but the special effects guys did give her a bit of help. Here's how they did it:
- Hydraulic pumps were installed on the inside of some of the Christine "stunt doubles".
- The pumps were attached to the cars' bodywork.
- When the pumps compressed, they pulled the metal inwards.
- Film footage of the inward crumpling body was reversed to show Christine "retaking shape".
"Christine"
Cool Moments:
The scene where Christine completely repairs herself after being smashed by Buddy's gang, and Arnie looks on, having completely lost his mind.
Christine smashes her fenders as she pursues Moochie down a narrow alley.
The entire Buddy Reperton chase scene, notably:
- Smashing Buddy's Camaro.
- Destroying the gas station, making it blow up with the two thugs inside.
- Christine on fire. That's just an awesome visual. How did they do that? And it's driving!
- Christine on fire chasing and running over Buddy.
Christine continually trying to rebuild herself as Dennis and Leigh run over her with the bulldozer.
Finally seeing Christine compressed into a cube.
Stats:
Photos: