A Christmas Carol (1951) Review

Every holiday season, my family whips out the Christmas specials. My parents and I have three main ones. We watch the obvious "Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown" and How the Grinch Stole Christmas", which are always a delight. They're short, but they pack a lot of heart in. They're always fun to watch back to back on a cold winter night. The film that I always look most forward to however, is the 1951 version of "A Christmas Carol", or "Scrooge" depending on who you're talking to.

The film is a classic retelling of the Charles Dickens story, about the quintessential curmudgeon himself, Ebeneezer Scrooge, played by Alastair Sim. He's a bitter, greedy old man who thinks Christmas is humbug, a word that quite frankly should be brought back into modern vocabulary, but I digress. On Christmas Eve, he is visited by his late business partner Jacob Marley, played by Michael Hordern. He tells Scrooge that he will be visited by three spirits, the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future (or things to come depending on who you're talking to). There, the three spirits try to help Scrooge re-discover the true meaning of Christmas.

For me, no one can beat Alastair Sim as Scrooge. His performance is nearly perfect. He really knows who to play the bitter, selfish Scrooge, while also playing the warm and generous Scrooge at the end (sorry if I spoiled that for anyone. I figured it was common knowledge, or common sense depending on who you're talking to). He can also be quite funny, and this comes from not out of wit, but out of his more pathetic side while he's bitter Scrooge, and his sheer, boyish excitement when he's... born again Scrooge?

As far as I know, the screenplay is very faithful to both the original Charles Dicken's story, and to it's language (which I could listen to all day, it's so beautifully written). The beauty of this story is that it's obviously set at Christmas, so we quickly assume it's attached to Christmas morals, which is true. The thing is though, it goes so far beyond that. It's one of the few Christmas movies I've seen where the message goes far past just Christmas. From the nature of greed, to the nature of good will. From fear and mortality, to optimism and hope, this movie captures a lot of ideas and thoughts we have around this time of year, and present them in an exquisite manner.

If I have one minute problem with this movie, it's the direction. Not so much with the way the story is told, because the pacing is actually quite excellent, and it hits all the right points. My main issue is that it's pretty dated. The aesthetic is actually pretty unusual, even for 1951. Things like the transitions with the hour glass and the occasionally awkward ghost effects can sometimes cheapen the movie. To tell you the truth though, it never really bothered me that much. It's just something I noticed. Maybe that's part of the charm of it.

The holiday's are never complete without "A Christmas Carol". It's a beautiful story that's timeless (well, except for the direction) and full of heart. In it's writing and in it's performances. While I have minor qualms with the direction, it's hardly worth noting, and you can tell that the director, Brian Desmond Hearst, really loved the story and wanted to do it the justice that it deserved. Out of that came a Christmas treat that I dare say is necessary viewing not just for the holiday's, but for those who are in need of a little optimism.