As is tradition Scrooge: A Christmas Carol is this year’s faithful adaptation of the classic Charles Dickens novella. It’s the story you know, it’s animated, it has songs, and it’s on Netflix. But does assume the latest A Christmas song offer something new, or should you stick with the two or three versions of the story that you already watch every year?
The essentials: The title basically says it all. This is a new animated feature film version of A Christmas songalbeit one from the 1970s Scrooge – the live-action musical starring Albert Finney in the title role. The area of overlap between these two versions consists primarily of songs by the late Leslie Bricusse, many of which are refreshed and re-presented in this animated feature. If you consider that the 1970 Scrooge Contains no tap-dancing frogs, Scottish ducks or Bill’s Murray, it is incredibly likely that most listeners will be unfamiliar with these tunes. And if you want to rewind and see the original, you can find Scrooge from the 1970s on Paramount+.
Which movies will it remind you of?: As mentioned, this one is heavily inspired by the 1970s Scrooge — so much so that Leslie Bricusse gets a co-writing credit for the film (it passed in 2021).
Notable performance: Olivia Colman stands out as the charming, seemingly naïve (but oh-so-wise) Ghost of Christmas Past. Her character design, that of a burning candle made out of shape-shifting wax, is also inspired and features some kinetic visuals throughout her sequence.
Memorable dialogue: As an example of this film’s approach to portrayal, here’s Scrooge to his overly optimistic nephew: “Harry, life is full of disappointments. Such a disappointment came on the glorious Christmas day that you stumbled into this world – the same Christmas day that your mother, my beloved sister, left it.”
A holiday tradition: At this point always a new version of A Christmas song Every year is the tradition.
Two lovebirds: This is not the only version of A Christmas song this year. If you want to make this a dual function, you can pair Scrooge: A Christmas Carol with its spiritual sequel Apple TV+ Spirited.
Does the title make sense?: Considering this is a simple take on and borrows from the Dickens classic Scrooge, the title makes sense. It also doesn’t help to distinguish it from the dozen other titled films Scrooge or A Christmas song.
Our opinion: Considering that there are hundreds of versions of A Christmas song already exist, each new version of the 179-year-old story must justify its existence. Every family, probably every person in every family, already has their favorite version of A Christmas song, and they are ready to defend it. It will be a long time before a new version of this story catches on, especially since children today have parents who grew up on the (modern) classics.
This version of Scrooge avoids all the tricks that have helped other customizations become permanent fixtures. This is not an imitation set in a different country or time period. It does not feature any pre-existing characters playing the roles. It is, quite bluntly, A Christmas song as told by Dickens. It is notable for its modern approach to storytelling, where everything in a story has to bump into everything else like dominoes. The film immediately focuses on Scrooge’s relationship with his nephew Harry (renamed from the original Fred) and really emphasizes why Scrooge hates Harry and therefore Christmas. Scrooge literally meets Tiny Tim long before he knows who he is. There’s even a surprising connection between Scrooge and Bob Cratchit, a connection that also has to do with Scrooge’s broken engagement.
The selling point for some may be Leslie Bricusse’s songs, particularly those who count 1970’s Scrooge among their favorite versions. However, removing these traditional songs from their original live-action context and placing them in fantastical, neon-colored CG-animated scenes removes much of the warmth of these songs, warmth provided by film grain and desaturated colors.
The character designs stand out – particularly this portrayal of Jacob Marley, complete with glowing fiery yellow eyes. But even with those in mind, this version of A Christmas song doesn’t have enough to really stand out in what is arguably the most crowded subcategory of vacation movies. The story is told more quickly Mickey’s Christmas carol, The Muppet Christmas Carol has a better Scrooge, the Alastair Sim Scrooge 1951 is scarier (if that’s what you’re looking for), and the very movie it’s loosely based on has better versions of those songs. And that’s the problem with customization A Christmas song yet again. They invite comparison with some of the most popular holiday works of the last hundred years.
Our appeal: SKIP IT. Your acting version of A Christmas song is not yet in danger of being dethroned.