Keith Gordon as Arnie Cunningham in Christine (1983)
Vitals
Keith Gordon as Arnie Cunningham, high school senior
Rockbridge, California, Fall/Winter 1978
Film: Christine
Release Date: December 9, 1983
Director: John Carpenter
Costume Designer: Darryl Levine
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
No shitter ever came between me and Christine!
Christine drove into theaters 40 years ago today, directed by the great John Carpenter and adapted by Bill Phillips from Stephen King’s supernatural horror novel of the same name that had been published just months earlier. The titular Christine is a white-over-red 1958 Plymouth Fury, high-schooler Arnie Cunningham’s prized possession… and possibly also possessed by a homicidal demon.
The more he dedicates himself to restoring Christine, the more Arnie’s attitude shifts from awkward to arrogant, though his newfound confidence helps him land a date with the popular Leigh Cabot (Alexandra Paul), a situation that drives Christine to such jealousy that she refuses to start until Arnie insists that Leigh will never come between him and his car.
Arnie’s statements are soon put to the test when he and Leigh walk into the garage and find that Christine has been vandalized by a gang of bullies that have been targeting Arnie. Arnie’s fury—and, well his Fury—continues to alienate him from his family and friends, including his one-time best friend Dennis Guilder (John Stockwell), whom he frightens during a New Year’s Eve joyride that turns into a nightmare fueled by Christine’s violent desire for revenge.
What’d He Wear?
Christine delves into the dark side of “fabulous fifties” nostalgia, sartorially represented by Arnie restyling himself in the fashions of Christine’s heyday as he grows increasingly influenced by the ’58 Fury. He chooses the obvious touchpoint of ultimate ’50s bad boy James Dean, frequently dressing in a red windbreaker and blue jeans that recall Dean’s iconic costume in Rebel Without a Cause, though Arnie—despite cursing at his mom (“well, fuck you!”) and choking his dad (“take your mitts off me, motherfucker!”)—ain’t Jim Stark.
Trouble at the Cunningham home.
Arnie’s soft red jacket also recalls another major Stephen King adaptation of the early ’80s, as Jack Nicholson dressed for the final act of The Shining in a burgundy corduroy blouson-style jacket while stalking the Overlook Hotel in a mad rage.
Arnie’s jacket has a soft burgundy shell with a suede-like, velveteen finish. When the screen-worn jacket was auctioned in May 2010, the listing described it as “dark red corduroy”, though even in close-ups of the film I can’t see the tufted fabric that would suggest even a pinwale or needlecord cloth, so I suspect it’s just a velveteen cotton or similarly treated synthetic fabric.
Arnie’s red jacket presents a soft napped finish more aligned with velvet or suede than the corduroy mentioned in the 2010 auction listing.
The design resembles the familiar “Harrington jacket” with its standing collar, straight-zip front, and blouson-style waistband, though several characteristics differentiate it from the defining Baracuta G9 and the G4-style jacket that Arnie had previously worn during his “nerdy” era.
The front zipper is covered by a shot storm fly that fastens with a single black-covered snap at the waist and another on the neck of the rounded standing collar. The jacket boasts a set-in chest pocket over the left side and two lower-positioned hand pockets. The set-in sleeves are finished with burgundy ribbed-knit cuffs that match the ribbed knitting around the waist hem. Behind each armhole is a “bi-swing” pleat for greater range of movement.
Arnie debuts the jacket on screen during the traumatic incident in the garage when his relationship with Leigh immediately fizzles upon his seeing what Buddy Repperton (William Ostrander) and his friends did to Christine. Underneath the jacket, he wears a dark-navy jersey-knit cotton turtleneck.
When Arnie visits Dennis in the hospital on Thanksgiving with a six-pack, he wears the red jacket again, now partially zipped over a black polyester long-sleeved shirt that has a spread collar and button-up front placket.
Finally, Arnie dresses for the fateful New Year’s Eve joyride in his favorite red jacket, now zipped over a slate-gray jersey-knit cotton turtleneck that echoes the style of his earlier dark-navy jumper.
Arnie knocks back a fictional Southern Cross beer on New Year’s Eve: “A toast! Death to the shitters of the world in 1979.”
Arnie’s dark indigo denim jeans are Wrangler, informed by the sharp “W”-shaped stitching across the back pockets. Wrangler jeans are also characterized by a brown leather branded patch positioned on the back-right pocket, just a few inches above the “W”, though it either remains covered by the hem of Arnie’s jacket or was removed prior to the production.
These straight-cut, zip-fly jeans follow the regular five-pocket arrangement of two patch-style back pockets, two curved-entry front pockets, and a watch/coin pocket inset on the front right side. The stiffness and appearance of the cloth suggests the 65% cotton/35% polyester 14-oz. “Super Denim” that Wrangler offered through the late ’70s into the ’80s.
We get a fine close-up of Arnie’s shoes as he puts the pedal to the medal, though the clearest details I can discern are the black calf leather uppers with a straight toe-cap. They appear to lack laces and extend at least as high as Arnie’s ankles, suggesting Chelsea boots, which would be a more sophisticated alternative to the buckle-laden engineer boots that Dean wore in Rebel Without a Cause.
The Car
Oh, man, there is nothing finer than being behind the wheel of your own car! Except maybe for pussy!
One of the most famous fictional cars of all time, Christine is a red-and-white 1958 Plymouth Fury two-door hardtop coupe. The Fury is shown purchased secondhand and in considerable disrepair for only $250 by Arnie, who restores it to the original shining glory as Christine would have looked when she was brand-new, two decades earlier.
Detroit, 1958: a legend is born.
Stephen King intentionally chose the 1958 Plymouth Fury both for its angry-sounding name and the fact that he considered the model a “forgotten car”. Her name reportedly came from George Romero’s wife Christine, as King was filming Creepshow (1982) in Pittsburgh with the Romeros when he conceptualized the novel. (For what it’s worth, the novel Christine was actually set in Pittsburgh, but the film shifted the setting to a small town outside L.A.)
Written before the Internet made such research easier, King’s novel included a few inaccuracies, specifying a four-door Fury with an automatic transmission controlled by a shift lever, when—in fact—the only Fury models available in 1957 or 1958 were two-door hardtops. Manual and TorqueFlite automatic transmissions were available, but the latter was only controlled by a push-button transmission. (The film remedies the body style and transmission errors present in the novel.)
To depict Christine on screen, John Carpenter’s crew placed ads throughout southern California. Only 5,303 Fury models had been produced by Plymouth in 1958—and all produced in “buckskin beige” rather than Christine’s custom red-and-white exterior—so transportation coordinator Eddie Lee Voelker’s team widened their scope to contemporary Belevedere and Savoy models.
After the two-year search that exhausted 15% of the film’s budget, at least 24 two-door Plymouth hardtops from the late ’50s were purchased in various states of repair and used to construct a total of 17 Christines, each serving a different function: some were pristine “showcase” cars, others were chopped to fit the cameras for driving sequences, and others were junked to depict Christine’s frequent damage. Using rubber molds and internally mounted hydraulics, special effects supervisor Roy Arbogast also met Carpenter’s challenge of developing a Christine that could “regenerate” herself on screen by running the film backwards.
The shots of Christine’s engine show a 350 cubic-inch V8, the top-of-the-line Chrysler “Super Commando” B-series offered as an upmarket alternative to the base 318 V8. Mated to the three-speed TorqueFlite automatic transmission and carbureted by twin four-barrel Carters, this ’58 Fury could generate up to 305 gross horsepower—a force to contend with when ramming her 3,850-pound mass into a victim. (According to Fraser Engine Co., the mean engine sounds we hear on screen aren’t of a Chrysler 350 V8 but rather a 1970 Mustang 428 Super Cobra Jet.)
1958 Plymouth Fury
1958 Plymouth Fury
Body Style: 2-door hardtop coupe
Layout: front-engine, rear-wheel-drive (RWD)
Engine: 350 cu. in. (5.7 L) Chrysler “Golden Commando” B-series V8 with dual Carter 4-barrel carburetors
Power: 305 hp (227.4 kW; 309 PS) @ 5000 RPM
Torque: 370 lb·ft (502 N·m) @ 3600 RPM
Transmission: 3-speed TorqueFlite automatic
Wheelbase: 118 inches (2997 mm)
Length: 206 inches (5232 mm)
Width: 79.4 inches (2017 mm)
Height: 53.5 inches (1359 mm)
Two Christines survived the production undamaged, with Ed Vickroy purchasing most of the cars and parts for $1,500, shipping them to Bill and Ed’s Auto Dismantling in Fontana, California, from where he sold everything to automotive enthusiasts, restorers, and film fans within two years. One of these collectors is Bill Gibson of Pensacola, Florida, who maintains the Christine Movie Car website and books out his fine-looking Fury for many fan events across the country.
The white-over-red Plymouth Fury shows up several times across Stephen King’s other works, including driven by the bullying Butch Bowers in the 1986 novel It and by the abusive Johnny Clayton in his 2012 novel 11/22/63. Evidently, King is fascinated by these cars but think very highly of the sort of people who drive them.
How to Get the Look
Keith Gordon as Arnie Cunningham in Christine (1983)
Arnie himself is trying to cop a classic cinematic costume by appropriating James Dean’s red windbreaker and jeans in Rebel Without a Cause, but with a degree more sophistication with his jacket’s soft suede-like shell, swapping the plain undershirt for jersey-knit turtlenecks, and dressier black boots.
- Burgundy velveteen cotton windbreaker with single-snap standing collar, straight-zip front, set-in breast pocket, open hand pockets, bi-swing back pleats, and ribbed-knit cuffs and hem
- Dark-navy jersey-knit cotton turtleneck
- Dark indigo denim Wrangler five-pocket straight-cut jeans
- Black leather cap-toe Chelsea boots
Do Yourself a Favor and…
Check out the movie.
The Quote
Let me tell you a little something about love, Dennis. It has a voracious appetite. It eats everything. Friendship. Family. It kills me how much it eats. But I’ll tell you something else. You feed it right, and it can be a beautiful thing, and that’s what we have. You know, when someone believes in you, man, you can do anything—any fucking thing in the entire universe. And when you believe right back in that someone, then watch out world, because nobody can stop you then, nobody! Ever!
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