A Christmas Carol (2009) - Robert Zemeckis' Favorite Time Travel Story

A Christmas Carol: Casting Jim Carrey As Scrooge Really Required Lateral Thinking

Everybody always wants to take a crack at Charles Dickens' classic novel, and here is another try, "A Christmas Carol" (2009). Bill Murray did well with it in Scrooged, and it seems like someone else tries it in one form or another each year. Robert Zemeckis of ImageMovers Digital/Walt Disney Pictures is no stranger to Christmas animation films (The Polar Express), so he signed on Jim Carrey and went for it. Zemeckis, of course, is as close to a living Hollywood animation legend as you can get these days - besides "Polar Express," he directed "Who Framed Roger Rabbit," which heralded the return of animation to the big time back in 1988. In any event, here the 3-D animation results are delightful and very faithful to the book.

Scrooge confronting a spirit

Ebeneezer Scrooge (Carrey) is a bitter old moneylender who hates Christmas. He is a mean man in general, and won't celebrate it in any way. Not only that, but he won't let his employee Bob Cratchit (Gary Oldman) take the day off unless he makes a special request that he approves. As far as Christmas is concerned, his attitude is "Bah, humbug."

Young Scrooge waiting for his father

On Christmas Eve night, he goes home as usual but has a vision. It is his old business partner, Jacob Marley (Oldman), who died seven years before. He has come to warn Scrooge that things haven't turned out well for him in the afterlife because of his greedy days working with Scrooge: he must walk around with heavy chains as penance. He tells Scrooge that three other spirits will come to visit and he had better heed them; then, he leaves.

Cratchit and Tiny Tim

Scrooge soon sees the first spirit: the Ghost of Christmas Past (Carrey). The spirit shows Scrooge that he became the way he is because his father neglected him during the holidays, while he only was brought home from boarding school by his sweet sister Fan (Robin Wright). Later, he was engaged to a woman named Belle (Wright), but she left him because of his money-grubbing ways. Scrooge dismisses the spirit by extinguishing him with his candle snuffer.

DVD cover

A little later, the second spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Present, arrives. He shows Scrooge that his nephew, Fred, jokes about Scrooge's tight ways, while Cratchit is barely able to make ends meet with the pittance paid by Scrooge. Cratchit also, unknown to Scrooge, has a young son named Tiny Tim (Oldman) who is sickly and may not live much longer. The spirit also shows Scrooge two children who become insanely violent criminals because they were neglected every Christmas.

Marley warning Scrooge

The third spirit then shows up, the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come (Carrey). He frightens Scrooge and chases him through London, then shows him his own future: when Scrooge passes away, Fred welcomes only his inheritance from Scrooge and dishonors his memory; his maid robs him for petty proceeds; nobody wants to attend his funeral except to get free food; and Tiny Tim dies through lack of expensive care. Scrooge himself, the spirit strongly implies, will wind up burning in the fires of Hell, then departs. The next morning, Scrooge is a changed man and shows it to everyone he meets.

Scrooge up close

The film was a smash hit both in the US and the UK, topping the box office in both places. It is a treat for the eyes, with striking imagery emphasized by the half-real visual style. Dialog is lifted straight out of book, which enhances the points made and keeps the film-makers from making their own points instead of those intended by Dickens. The score by Alan Silvestri blends wonderfully with the on-screen action, and you get bits of traditional holiday tunes which help keep you in the holiday spirit. The opening title sequence, when the camera flies through the air giving us a view of Victorian London, is breathtaking, especially in 3-D.

There are great visuals throughout

The film, though, isn't perfect. The early scenes drag, and Carrey - well-intentioned, I'm sure, and a classic physical comedian - really isn't the ideal choice to add depth to a very serious story told in thick period British accents. A scene where a miniature Scrooge is chased by a carriage just hits the wrong notes, fun as it is on screen (some would say the sequence is the highlight of the film), one that Carrey the comedian could handle with ease, but hamstrings Carrey the dramatic actor. It is quite difficult - and vital - to get the tone right in an adaptation like this, where everyone knows the story and is looking for execution over plot. The personal nature of the story can only be conveyed by raw human expressions of true emotion - something that animation, for all its tremendous virtues, is not well-crafted to convey, and Carrey especially is not the right messenger. In animation in any event, it is difficult to convey raw human vulnerability, and this story, like no other, requires that sensation to succeed. Unfortunately, that aspect is lacking, though many will be quite satisfied without that sort of depth.

Scrooge - will he learn his lesson?

This is a dark version of the story, which, to be truthful, is the only way to be faithful to the book. Dickens was a great author, but he was surrounded by the horrors of the burgeoning industrial age. Child workers, dangerous factory jobs seven days a week from dawn to dusk, poor people thrown into ghastly, disease-ridden jails - he saw it all. When he wrote that Scrooge was destined for Hell, he wasn't thinking of some cartoony aren't-those-cool-flames kind of place like you might see in, oh, not to pick on anybody in particular ((cough cough) Southpark (cough cough)). The ending is a little too Carrey-the-comedian, not "Thank the sweet baby Jesus I might yet escape that burning pit of damnation for all eternity."

Scrooge having a little fun

Along those lines, this really is a difficult film for children. Marley's ghost has a flapping jaw that is pretty gruesome, and some other scenes are edgy. The film is rated PG, and is not the cutesy Mickey Mouse tale (though that is a wonderful version, too!). This is best for adults, perhaps families, but certainly not for toddlers or even every tween.

Special Amtrak "A Christmas Carol" exhibition train in 2009

Overall, it is a worthy addition to the Christmas catalog, but only for the right audience. If you fit into that category, this could become an annual treat every December. Just try to watch it in 3-D, it makes a difference.

Below is the official trailer.

2012

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The Polar Express (2004) - Tom Hanks Takes Us to Santa

The Polar Express: If Everyone Didn't Look So Creepy, This Would Have Been A Major Hit

"The Polar Express" (2004), directed by Robert Zemeckis based on the book by Chris Van Allsburg, is one of the most controversial holiday films ever made. Usually you don't think of holiday productions as controversial, but this one managed it because of the type of animation used. As the first feature to use live action capture animation techniques, it enchanted some viewers and creeped out others. Always, though, you have the reassuring presence of Tom Hanks to keep things from getting out of hand, and over time, many have come to accept and even enjoy the somewhat awkward movement of the characters.

A smile of satisfaction

It is the 1950s in Grand Rapids, Michigan. A little boy wants to believe in Santa, but he can't find any proof in books or magazines. As the night draws on, though, he goes outside and finds a mysterious train. The conductor says it is the "Polar Express" headed to the North Pole to visit Santa. He boards the train, and it heads through various environments, some quite hostile.

A happy little girl with her ticket

There are other children on the train, including Billy, who is from the same hometown of Grand Rapids, Michigan. The conductor comes through and punches the children's tickets that appear in their pockets. A girl's ticket, though, gets lost, and the conductor takes her on the roof of the train. Finding the ticket, the boy takes it up to the roof to give to the conductor, but runs into a hobo who claims he owns the train. The hobo helps him complete his mission just before the train enters a low tunnel that would have knocked him off the roof.

All aboard!

Winding up in the train's engine, the boy finds the girl driving it. The engineer and fireman, she explains, are fixing a light. The boy gives the girl her ticket.

Beautiful railroad cars

When they arrive at the North Pole, Billy is alone in the observation car because he does not want to meet Santa due to his background of bad Christmases. The car gets unhooked, and the car drifts to industrial areas of Santa's workshop, visiting various parts of Santa's operation such as the Wrapping Hall and a warehouse. Ultimately, they all get back to where they are supposed to be via airship.

Wolves await in the forest

Santa gives the boy his choice of presents as "The First Gift of Christmas," and he chooses a silver bell that he saw fall off of Santa's sleigh, which he puts in his pocket. After Santa leaves on his journey, though, he loses the bell. They then return home.

The locomotive

The next morning, his sister Sarah finds a present for him hidden behind the tree. It turns out to be the bell. Both he and his sister hear it ring, but their parents do not, because they no longer believe in Santa.

The sound of Christmas

Tom Hanks voices the Conductor, Santa, the Hobo, the Narrator and other characters, while Peter Scolari, Hanks' old pal from "Bosom Buddies," voices Billy, and Josh Hutcherson is the boy. Eddie Deezen, Nona Gaye, Tinashe and Meagan Moore all provide vocal support for the other characters.

Santa's Sleigh!

There isn't much of a plot, but, then, the source book was only a 32-page picture book, so making an entire feature out of it at all was a bit of a stretch. Basically, the boy boards a train that goes where it is supposed to go, and then returns him home. If you watch this for the story line you are bound to be disappointed. You have to be open to the occasional thrills and chills associated with the ride, the sheer oddness of the entire experience, the beautiful winter scenery which is sure to put you in the holiday spirit even if you view it in July, and the feeling the film gives you about the holiday season. It is a very traditional story, and the high point is the extravagant nature of Santa's abode. The magnificence of it is rooted in the realization of childhood memories and the wish that reality would conform to our own hopes and desires. That the real world might bend to our needs, even just for that one special day, is what gives "The Polar Express" is this film's sole reason for being.

Tom Hanks helped create all three of these characters!

The animation used by Castle Rock is so life-like in some ways that you will be confounded at whether it is real or not. However, while it is good at capturing larger movements, tiny facial expressions are beyond it. The characters wind up looking stiff and unhuman. Once you accept that, though, you can sit back and enjoy the technical wizardry that makes the characters real, but not real. It portrays almost a twilight zone of existence, between the living and the dead, which works with the story as being somewhere between dreams and reality. You are meant to feel disoriented and on a different plane of thought and emotion, and to a large degree the awkward animation works quite well. The old Rankin/Bass specials worked because they explicitly were not real and thus just a warm-hearted story, while this type of animation confuses the issue, creating a sense of imbalance and unease which works on the trip north.

The train approaches its destination

A 3D format was introduced for this film, and the IMAX 3-D version plays annually at IMAX theaters even though the film has been released on 2-D and 3-D Blu-ray and regular DVD discs. The transfer to video was gorgeous, this film looks spectactular on a good home theater set-up. There is a Polar Express ride at SeaWorld Orlando during the holiday season each year as well as various other theme parks. A lot of detail went into the train itself, which is closely modeled after a train in Michigan.

Now that's a tree!

Looked at solely as a piece of animation, the film is not very impressive except on a purely technical level, where it was cutting edge at the time but since has been surpassed. The results of the motion capture process used are too close to reality in some ways, and too far away in others. The problem with this is that most people don't go to a feel-good holiday movie to be made uncomfortable. However, solely in the context of this film, interpreting the entire Polar Express ride as a kind of dream, the animation works quite well, even spectacularly. Many people are willing to go with it, and because of that the film has become a continuing cult hit.

Thank you, Santa

You might want to watch the trailer (copy below) and see how you feel about the animation. If it doesn't phase you, and you want a heart-warming holiday experience, 'The Polar Express" will give you a lot of happy memories.

Below is the trailer:





2012

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