Ollie Hopnoodle's Haven of Bliss

My family and I have been watching this movie at least once every summer since 1988 (we taped it). It's one of those movies you can watch a thousand times, have every line memorized, and still laugh at all the same jokes. One thing I noticed about this one is that they switched the characters of Schwartz and Flick. In "A Christmas Story", Schwartz is the cool, cocky one and Flick is the pathetic loser. In this installment, Flick is the cool one and Schwartz is the loser. Is this intended? Oh well, no matter what it's a great movie. The people who play the parents are excellent. Especially James Sikking, he is absolutely hilarious. I want to see this on DVD sometime soon. Everyone should see this movie. Family Channel should run it again.

Continuing adventures of Ralphie and family from "A Christmas Story" and "A Summer Story"...aka "It Runs in the Family." Jean Shepard is back as narrator and writer but as in all films, an original cast (they do such a good job capturing the spirit of the actors in "A Christmas Story" that you won't notice the cast change). Great nostalgic fun from the Walt Disney Channel. Note: Though this film was made second, it actually falls third according to the period of the film.

There are more Jean Shepherd films than some folks know about, starting with a truly great pair of movies, The Phantom of the Open Hearth (1978), and The Great American 4th of July and Other Disasters (1982). These two are absolutely wonderful, low budget PBS American Playhouse prequels to A Christmas Story (1983), the classic movie that put Shepherd on the maps of millions. Squeezed in there after Xmas Story is The Star-Crossed Romance of Josephine Cosnowski (1985), also charming and set in Ralphie's senior year, then finally this one: Ollie Hopnoodle's Haven of Bliss in 1988. I won't even mention It Runs in the Family, that unfortunate entry from 1994, except to say it's better than this one.

This one barely holds up, and although it doesn't have the charms of the previous four Shepherd films, it is still sorta worth watching because it's all we have.

I'm really not sure why this particular installment was stretched out to 90 minutes, because it drags on, and it's clear it was just filling cinematic time. Maybe Disney had a slot to fill and they dragged this one out in the editing room. Ollie Hopnoodle would have benefitted from the 50 minute runtime format of Great American 4th of July, and the Phantom of the Open Hearth. This film is a bore and a chore. I get it, we want to love it because it's Jean Shepherd, and the library is all it will ever be, but honestly it's spread thin.

So, the whole movie is cobbled together, which isn't unusual for a Shep film story. But this one is drawn out too long. It's not all bad, but it lacks the genuine charms of the fantastic four Shep films that precede it. If nothing else, it's a nostalgic piece of storytelling where we get to sit back and bask in the glorious voice of Jean Shepherd's timelessly spun narratives, and we will never get another one. That much is a good thing.

The late Jean Shepherd who wrote "In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash", which "A Christmas Story" was based on wrote and narrated this funny little movie based on his short story of the same name. It deals with the same family from "A Christmas Story" though with different actors and their family vacation when Ralph(ie) is 14 and all the crazy things that happen before and during their long drive to their favorite vacation spot. If you like "A Christmas Story" you'll probably like this movie too. It's quite funny in a low key sort of way.

This is a great movie. I am surprised, given how popular the Christmas Story is, that they have not released this to DVD as a sequel. I wish I could get a copy to show my kids, but have never been able to find it. Many favorite lines that we can relate to, e.g. when the family kinds a junky gift shop, "somehow, things that you would never buy at home, when you are on vacation, they make sense!" The movie has the same slow-paced, Garrison-Keillor-type wry humor that the Christmas Story has. It has the same nostalgic sense that times of blue-collar kitsch were silly, but also there was something noble about the attempt of the working man to create beauty.