I’ve often said that the 1984 version of A Christmas Carol, starring George C. Scott as ‘Scrooge’ and Edward Woodward as ‘The Ghost of Christmas Present’, is my favourite. I’ve given my reasons in the past, so I’ll not post them in the OP unless asked. Instead, I wanted to post about another version.
Last night I watched the 1971 animated version, featuring the voice of Alistair Sim as ‘Scrooge’, on YouTube (on the big screen TV). When I saw it as a kid, I thought it was awesome. First, it was in colour. Previously, I’d only seen B&W versions. And as a kid, I liked cartoons. And it was actually a little scary. Now, the animation looks crude. Of course cartoons looked different then. But the animation looked a bit different from other cartoons. It was dark and bleak, and I think in retrospect it had an avant garde look to it that was popular at the time. It was also, very short; coming in at 25 minutes. Watching it last night, it felt like a Cliff’s Notes version. Nevertheless, it impressed me as a child, and it was good to see it again. Oh, and it also won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film in 1972.
I’ve written about watching different versions of A Christmas Carol in the recently-watched movies thread, and I wrote about this one.
I like it because it was produced by Check Jones and directed by Richard Williams (who did the animation for Who Framed Roger Rabbit) They deliberately used period illustrations, including those by Leech, as inspiration for the style. And they not only got Alistair Sim to play Scrooge from the 1951 movie, they also got Michael Hordern to do Marley’s Ghost from that version.
I’d heard about this version for years, but missed it on its first broadcast. I didn’t see it until a friend dubbed a DVD for me a few years ago (and now I can’t find the damned thing).
I agree that George C. Scott was the overall best portrayer of Scrooge – he’s a master actor and, I think, not fully appreciated. But his version is not my favorite (I haven’t seen the Patrick Stewart version).
My overall favorite is the Robert Zemeckis version with Jim Carey. It captures the look and feel of London in the period, references the Leech illustrations perfectly, includes most of the incidents of the story, including ones that most other versions leave out, and even includes some of Dickens’ more obscure references (like the bit about closing shops that affected the poor, and the use of “Walker!” as a derisive expression). I don’t even mind the excessive slapstick added to the film, or the use of shots that only really work in 3D.
My next favorite is the Mr. Magoo Christmas Carol, partly because it was the first version I ever saw, but also because it’s surprisingly well-done, fitting the story in to a short time, and having songs done by a Broadway team. It’s also cute that they have a “framing” story about Magoo being an actor portraying Scrooge. They also put in some sly references to UPA characters – I didn’t realize until years later that Tiny Tim was “played by” Gerald McBoing-Boing, who appeared in UPA cartoons in the 1950s (including one with Magoo)* And The Ghost of Christmas Present points in a line about Scrooge being too stingy to buy a pair of spectacles – not from the book, and so clearly a reference to Magoo. Finally, this was the very first made-for-TV cartoon Christmas special, predating both Rudolph and Charlie Brown.
Gerald McBoing-Boing, by the way, wasn’t invented by UPA. He was created by — Dr. Seuss! Seuss created him for a record, using a library of sound effects (Gerald didn’t speak in words – he spoke only in sound effects. His actually using human speech in Christmas Carol is an anomaly). The UPA cartoons gave him a look, and kept the only-speaking-in-sound-effects part.
I liked Scott’s portrayal better than Stewart’s. Scott’s glee when he says ‘If I could work my will, every idiot who goes about with “Merry Christmas” on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart!’ is unmatchable. Stewart does a fine job, but it seemed to me that he was playing the part the same way everyone else has… except for Scott.
I also liked Edward Woodward. The shot that does it for me is when Scrooge says, ‘It’s a very small goose.’ and Woodward leans into the frame and says, ‘Ti’s all Bob Cratchit can afford!’ And I think he delivered the line, ‘Are there no workhouses? Are there no prisons?’ and subsequent lines better than anyone. Then there’s the scene where Mrs. Cratchit tells one of the kids to ‘Butter the bread… thinly.’ I just think the '84 version has more depth than the others.
I was working at IBM when the George C. Scott version came out. IBM was the main underwriter of the film and had plenty of commercials when it was first shown, since 1984 was in the heyday of IBM’s personal computer business (remember the Charlie Chaplin advertising?). IBM employees were given the chance to order a hardcover book of the film, with the script and pictures; it was very nice. So I have a certain affection for this version.
Ditto on George C. Scott’s version being the best, although Scrooge should have been much thinner than Scott.
What I would love to see is a version generated from the different performances — Edward Woodward’s Ghost of Xmas Present spliced into Gene/Kathleen Lockhart’s Cratchits spliced into the Tiny Tim from the 1951 Sim version combined with Mr. Magoo’s Ghost of Xmas Yet to Come and so on (Roger Rees is the best Fred Holliwell).
Oh, he was. I quoted the second paragraph of the story once to a friends (I’d read it often enough to get it pretty close to correct:
He couldn’t believe that Dickens actually wrote the paragraph beginning with “Mind! I don’t mean to say…”. I suppose it sounded too whimsical, or too modern in its humor. But there it is. And it pops up in some of the weirdest places.
I am only interested in watching one version, the 1951 version. Every year I watch this once, and that’s it for the story for that year. I have never, incidentally, read the book.
I remember one year, when I was a child (probably 1956 or 1957), and I suspect that my parents found me and my sister too vested in the “how many presents will I get?” facet of the holiday spirit, they (parents) woke us (children) up at around 9:00 pm and sat us in front of the TV to watch this movie. This was unprecedented, and never happened again.
I think the reason I like this version is that Sim was essentially a comic actor, and was therefore able to make the last part of the movie very believable. He did well with the early parts too, because “curmudgeon” was one of his other acting specialties. Aside from Sim’s acting, I thought the visits from the spirits were all very well done and effective, especially for the time. Overall, I like this version because it is not too grim or too hopeless, even in the beginning. The lessons are there to be learned, especially that Scrooge was hurting himself more than anyone else with his behavior, and those lessons are all the more effective (to me) for not bludgeoning me about the head and shoulders to be sure I got it.
I have one question, that may be answered in the book: in the Spirit of Christmas Present segment, Scrooge sees his old fiancée, still alive and being saintly in some sort of care facility. After his conversion, might he not have re-established contact with her and become friends with her at any rate, and contributed money to some causes that were important to her? It seems fitting to round things out, but it is not mentioned.
I have not watched many of the other versions, but two that I did watch parts of I won’t be going back to: the musical version with Albert Finney, just too long and overdone; and the Jim Carrey version, in this case the special effects sequences were too long and overdone.
Permit me to suggest that you should. I find it an incredible read. It’s not very long, and is available free on the internet, although I like the Annotated version.
Available here, among other places:
Scrooge doesn’t try to reconnect with Belle in the book, or any other version I’m aware of.
There are lots of little incidents in the book not done in any film, and the 1951 invents a lot of things that aren’t in the book.
The George C. Scott version is memorable for several reasons, but my favorite part of the production is Marley’s ghost, played by Frank Finlay. Least favorite is Angela Pleasence as Ghost of Christmas Past. It is, of course, a made-for-TV production and has the associated budgetary constraints (you can actually see the wire holding the dunce cap off the ground). But the performances are uniformly very good and it entertains me every time I see it (annually).
Perhaps I should have added in my original post that I have not read the book, even though I know quite well where to find it, and can afford to pay for it, because I simply have not been interested in doing so.
Certainly all the other versions leave things out – I’ve pointed this out earlier in the thread. I didn’t mean to imply that the 1952 version was unique in this.
