A Review of Disney's A Christmas Carol

My wife and I took our grandchildren to see the new 3D version of Disney's A Christmas Carol. I am not a big fan of animated features but this is one that I actually wanted to see. I wrote an article a month or so ago on the great improvement in the presentation of 3D movies. The technology has really advanced and the result is amazing.

The rendering of the characters and the setting of early nineteenth century London was everything that I was hoping to see. The expressions on the faces and the attention to detail really brought the scenes to life. The shops, the street venders, and the people in the street made you feel like you were right in the movie. For some reason my eye was drawn to the scenes inside the Cratchit home. They seem to be especially well done. The rooms were just the way a very modest home would look in nineteenth century London.

It was a treat to have two of my favorite actors doing the voices of the main characters, among others. Jim Carrey and Gary Oldman did a fine job with the characters. They were supported by the fine voice talents of Robin Wright Penn, Colin Firth, and Bob Hoskins.

Everyone knows the classic story of Scrooge and how he found the spirit of Christmas. Ebenezer Scrooge was the cheapest and most miserable man in all of London; to him Christmas was humbug. On Christmas Eve Scrooge is visited by three spirits and, through images of the past, present, and future, they melt his cold heart and fill him with the spirit of Christmas. Dickens was trying his best to get people to have some compassion for the less fortunate. The story still warms the heart even after over two hundred and fifty years of telling.

Every story, that doesn't originate as a screenplay, is adapted for a movie or for presentation on television. The visual media requires modification to make the story flow properly on the screen. I understand this and I expect it. Anyone who has read a book and then saw the movie based on the book knows the stories are not the same, but, to me, the adaptation of this Dickens classic was a little overboard.

I know they had to play to the 3D technology and they were motivated to make a big impact but I am afraid they sacrificed Dickens' message in the process. All of the racing around and sliding down rooftops on icicles was great visually but it didn't fit Dickens. The impression I got from watching the lessons of these three spirits was that Scrooge changed his way because he was afraid to die, not because he realized that being an old miser was not the way to live. Being chased by the funeral wagon and the implication that he would die that very night made it seem like he was given the option to either change his ways or be killed. They did show Scrooge's heart melt when he saw Tiny Tim, but that theme seemed to disappear. Christmas future was supposed to focus on how Scrooge would be remembered after he passed on and not on the passing itself.

I enjoyed the movie. I just was a little disappointed in the message. It is worth seeing with your children and/or grandchildren, but maybe you should also read them the original story.