It wasn't a smash hit when it first reached theater screens in 1983. But since then, A Christmas Story has staked out unique territory in the pantheon of great Christmas films. Based on Midwestern humorist Jean Sheperd's classic book In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash. A Christmas Story stars Peter Billingsley as Ralphie Parker, a typical youngster of the '40s who, as the yuletide season approaches, finds himself longing for one elusive gift: a Red Ryder BB gun. Only problem is his mom (Melinda Dillon) won't even consider getting him the junior firearm for fear that Ralphie will "shoot his eye out." Meanwhile, The Old Man (Darrin McGavin) is busy admiring his sexy new leg lamp or haggling with a Christmas tree lot attendant for the best price on a six-footer. Gifted with acerbic first-person narration performed by Sheperd himself, A Christmas Story became a career high for everyone involved, not the least of which was its director, Bob Clark.

Clark's films have been, to say the least, eclectic. A stage director who, in 1966, was lured into filmmaking, the then 24-year-old Clark cut his teeth on The She Man, arguably the first motion picture about a transvestite spy. His debut quickly sank from sight, but nevertheless led him to a stint in drive-in moviemaking that, in the early 70s, culminated in a succession of memorable horror efforts: Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things; Deranged, a lurid biopic based on Wisconsin's favorite killer cannibal, Ed Gein; and, best of all, Black Christmas, the proto-slasher movie that, in 1975, beat John Carpenter's Halloween to screens by three years.

By the mid-70s, Clark had immigrated to Canada, where movie production was much cheaper and talent more abundant. He completed two more "respectable" movies, a Sherlock Holmes vs. Jack the Ripper yarn called Murder by Decree and a film version of the Broadway stage tearjerker, Tribute. Clark then directed what would ironically become his biggest hit - Porky's, basing the script on his own similar experiences as a 1950s-era Florida teenager.

In 1983, Clark was able to convince MGM to back A Christmas Story for production after working on the script for 10 years alongside Sheperd and his wife, Leigh Brown. Following a huge casting call, Billingsley, best know for his stint as Messy Marvin in the Hershey's squeezable bottle chocolate syrup commercials, was cast in the lead, while McGavin, the former star of the series, Kolchak: The Night Stalker, was goaded into delivering one of his best performances as the grumpy, often crude father. Melinda Dillon, fresh from Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Absence of Malice is also memorable as the family's supremely sweet mother. A Christmas Story didn't get any Academy Awards, but it did garner Clark two Canadian Oscars (called "Genies") for Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay (which Sheperd and Brown shared). And, of course, it went on to take its place with Miracle on 34th Street and It's A Wonderful Life as one of TV's holiday perennials. Its success also inspired Bob Clark to direct a little-seen 1994 sequel, originally called My Summer Story, but now on video as It Runs in the Family, with Kieran Culkin as Ralphie and Charles Grodin as The Old Man.

TNT viewers will have a whole day to check out Bob Clark and Jean Sheperd's holiday touchstone when it airs 24 Hours of A Christmas Story, beginning at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Thursday, December 24 and running continuously through the next day, concluding with a final showing at 6 p.m. ET/PT on Friday, December 25. Rating: TV-PG-L.