I came with an open mind. This, after all was the story my father had told us children, when we were snuggled up warm in our beds. He would plant a dining room chair in the hallway. And from memory he recited "the story of Scrooge." It was a little frightening, to be lying there in darkness, a bit of light streaming in from the hallway, as your father's voice suddenly turned all funny. He became, in turn, three spirits - voices different from Scrooge's own.
Dad did that each Christmas eve. Until we grew "too old for that," as he explained one year while putting his shaving soap on the tree, after putting up all the decorations, including the battered angel - the one my Mom got, that first Christmas in 1936 when Dad planted his first kiss on her lips, as they danced (he said) to English band leader Ray Noble's THE TOUCH OF YOUR LIPS.
Pardon my reverie . . . I just wanted to establish my credentials, for saying . . .
This is not merely the best version of my favorite story (Dad would tell you that; if he were alive this would be his 92nd Christmas). No, no. This is the most amazing "movie experience" that I have ever known. I cannot imagine how any film maker(s) could ever top this.
They had me hooked from the opening. The camera shows a beautifully bound copy of "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens. An invisible hand opens to the first page and those very words my own father composed . . .
Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it: and Scrooge's name was good . . . for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.
We see a corpse, its eyes held shut with pennies. Scrooge himself removes them from the eyes, at the end of the scene saying, without shame to the undertakers, while rubbing the coins together between thumb and finger, "Tuppence is tuppence!" The subtle change in the undertaker's face -- so subtle you might miss it in the half light of the almost dark room -- is one of dismay at seeing someone THAT cheap. The facial expression borders on horror.
Out in the street, children stop playing and dogs duck into alleys at Mr. Scrooge's approach, on his way to his place of business, with its gilt-lettered sign, "Scrooge & Marley Co." That will also be the closing scene of the movie, with Scrooge seen through frosty windows to be dancing with sheer, child-like joy, while outside, Bob Cratchit, for the very first time, turns to the `camera' and addresses us:
(Those very words my father composed out of thin air, Christmas 1949!)
"Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more; and to Tiny Tim, who did not die, he was a second father. He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew [and] ever afterwards, it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God Bless Us, Every One!"
I could share with you a hundred little details (the sort of details that otherwise concern "God and the Devil"). But "Let there be light!" sums up the effect on your eyes, as we see clearly despite only the very faintest light sources: and that is what sets this movie apart from any other ever made.
You're not conscious of it at first. Then it dawns on you. An entire scene has been done in the light of a distant street lamp. The lamp (never seen) is about 50 feet to your left. Your eyes are drawn to the wrought iron fence outside Scrooge's rather magnificent home. The camera goes in tight, and the texture of the wrought iron - you know the tiny little waves made by a ball peine hammer on the surface of the metal when it was forged . . . the light from that unseen street lamp, 50 feet distant, is just enough for you to see a glint of yellow on the shiny black metal finish.
This `cinematography' - working at light levels so low, they could never be captured by a digital `film' camera - is repeated in scene after scene. It makes the sunshine on Scrooge's face, and on Tiny Tim, held aloft on Scrooge's shoulder at movie's end so . . . welcome! Light has been used (finally!) to underline Scrooge's utter, endless joy (your own too).
I don't know if you, like me, will sit there, tears of joy streaming down your face, watching the closing credits. Only three other people were left in the theatre as the scroll of credits reached its end. (I watched this one with my mentally-handicapped friend "Michael" - please see our review of the last `best' Christmas movie "POLAR EXPRESS").
A couple and their 14 year old son sitting just ahead of us, delayed their departure, putting on their coats, discreetly so as not to block the view of the only two persons left watching intently. As if to explain my tear-stained face, I said to the woman (an investment counselor as it turns out): "I have to see who wrote that stirring `carol' --- a (mainly) men's choir led by a truly great tenor. Sure enough, the music was written by the last great film score composer, Alan Silvestri. He co-wrote all those wondrous songs like "When Christmas Comes to Town" for Polar Express; all the great incidental music for "Forrest Gump" too!
The couple's son explained how the 3-D glasses work. Oh yes. His mother had opened our conversation saying, "I actually caught one of those snowflakes" (felt it in her hand). Her son said (not convincingly to his Dad) "the snow looks (better) the closer you are to the screen." Together, they noticed that my friend Michael was still wearing his 3-D glasses, while sipping the last of his diet coke.
"Michael," I said, "is from a L'Arche home," waiting to see if the term `registered.' "That's for mentally-handicapped," volunteered Michael. Oh yes, and Michael agreed with me when I said, "that's the best movie I have ever seen."
Mark Blackburn
Winnipeg Manitoba Canada