When I think of Charles Dickens 1843 novella, A Christmas Carol, I'm reminded of what a remarkable and wonderful work of English literature it is. A story that stands the test of time and a tribute to the human spirit. Its truly one of the great storytelling efforts in book publishing history.
Beyond Dickens literary masterpiece, A Christmas Carol has been put on film and turned into movies numerous times. However, only a hand full are first class works of pure entertainment. And after all, movie watching is first and foremost about people being entertained.
Okay, here we go. First we have the 1935 film, Scrooge, a British version, starring Seymour Hicks as Ebenezer Scrooge. Yes, its a somewhat creaky film, without high-grade production values, but its still a fine early talky effort nonetheless. Then we have the 1938 Hollywood Golden Age version of A Christmas Carol, with Reginald Owen as Scrooge. Definitely a more light hearted version, but still, good old fashioned family entertainment. A couple other well known modern versions: the 1984 US TV film starring George C Scott as Ebenezer; and Patrick Stewart's 1999 effort as Scrooge. Both highly entertaining efforts.
The one true standout film that comes to mind, is the 1951 British film called, Scrooge. It stars Alastair Sim in what should have been an Oscar nominated performance for his playing Ebenezer Scrooge. Two of the five Oscar nominated performances for best actor that year, Humphrey Bogart for "The African Queen" and Marlon Brando for "A Streetcar Named Desire", were the top rated choices to win. The other three really had no chance of winning. Bogie took home the Oscar and rightly so. My point being, the Academy completely overlooked Sim's outstanding performance, and in the end didn't think he was worth a nomination for best actor. An historic oversight at the very least. In my opinion, a pathetic cop-out by the Academy that robbed Sim of his just reward, being an Oscar nominee.
Now its time to address the 2019 BBC production of A Christmas Carol, starring Guy Pearce as Scrooge. Call it, "lights, camera, atmosphere!". Production values were first class. Dialogue was very good. Cinematography, editing, sound and costumes, all top notch. And while the acting is good, its not going to carry the film into iconic or classic film territory. Sorry. The problem this version of A Christmas Carol has, is not technical related. Its the basic presentation that is flawed. Its way too dark, way too sorrowful and way too long. Also, it takes too much dramatic license and narrative license with the original Dickens story. And some of the segments were superfluous.
This film starts out rather slow and gets sort of tedious as it enters its second hour. Things do pick up in the third hour as it gets more on track with Charles Dickens original intent, and for that, it deserves an overall IMDb rating of 7.0. Not a great film, not a bad film. If the film makers had tightened up the script, may be edited out some of the more frivolous segments and cut the run time down to two-hours or so, it would have played better on the screen, been more entertaining with broader audience appeal.
As for the ending of the film, it has no punch and no closure whatsoever. Its like Guy Pearce did a mike-drop before the director yelled, CUT! Either that, or they just ran out of film.
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