{"id":1304,"date":"2013-12-21T05:10:18","date_gmt":"2013-12-21T11:10:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/?p=1304"},"modified":"2014-02-08T04:24:15","modified_gmt":"2014-02-08T10:24:15","slug":"a-christmas-carol-1984","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/?p=1304","title":{"rendered":"A Christmas Carol (1984)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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“I have endeavoured in this Ghostly little book, to raise the Ghost of an Idea, which shall not put my readers out of humour with themselves, with each other, with the season, or with me.\u00a0 May it haunt their houses pleasantly, and no one wish to lay it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Their faithful Friend and Servant,
\nC. D.
\nDecember, 1843.”<\/span><\/p>\n

The 170th anniversary of Charles Dicken’s classic Christmas tale has just passed, and there have been hundreds of versions of it produced in that time. \u00a0Everyone from Alastair Sim to Jim Carrey, Patrick Stewart, Albert Finney, Bill Murray, Mr. Magoo, Scrooge McDuck, and Michael Caine (in the Muppets<\/strong> version) have played the main character, miserly Ebinezer Scrooge. \u00a0It took Dickens just 6 weeks of intense writing to finish his little ghost story, but it’s one of the most adapted stories of all time.
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“Marley was dead: To begin with. \u00a0There is no doubt whatever about that…”
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To celebrate the 170th anniversary Neil Gaiman recently dressed up like Dickens and read the story to a crowd at the New York Public Library. \u00a0You can listen to it here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Neal<\/a>

Neal Gaiman as Charles Dickens<\/p><\/div>\n

My fav version of it comes from Britain, 1984. \u00a0A television production (tho it did play in theaters in Britain), it stars the awesomely talented George C. Scott as Scrooge. \u00a0If ever there was a person born for a role, this was it. \u00a0His Scrooge is a miserable, gruff, stingy old bastard, but not a monster. \u00a0Not a caricature or a cartoon, like many performers fall back on. \u00a0Scott’s Scrooge seems real, acts like a person with Scrooge’s past would act, like a very shrewd (and heartless) businessman.
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\nThe supporting roles are all also fantastic, featuring a bunch of talented British character actors lead by David Warner (one of my favs) as Bob Cratchit. \u00a0It also has Donald Pleasance’s daughter Angela as the ghost of Christmas Past, Edward Woodward (who got immolated in The Wicker Man<\/em>) in a booming performance as the Ghost of Christmas Present, Frank (Lifeforce, The Deadly Bees<\/em>) Finlay as Marley, and one of Tim Burton’s regulars Michael (The Horror of Dracula, Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors,<\/em> Alfred in Batman<\/em> (1989)) Gough in a small role.
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\nThe production is lush, with a lot of atmosphere and period feel. \u00a0You can almost smell the roast turkey and the smoke from the last burning embers in the fire in Scrooge’s workplace. \u00a0Feel the biting cold and snow. \u00a0They don’t shy away from getting creepy when it’s called for (after all, it is a ghost story), and the special effects are pretty good for it’s time and budget. \u00a0I’ve always been a sucker for a movie with great atmosphere.
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\nThe thing I like best about it is that it follows the book closer than any other version I’ve seen. \u00a0Most everyone knows the plot- Ebinezer Scrooge is a miserable old miser who thinks that love, sentimentality, and Christmas are a waste of time and money (“A poor excuse for picking a man’s pocket every 25th of December”). \u00a0His one assistant, Bob Cratchit, has a large family including a sickly and disabled son, Tiny Tim. \u00a0On Christmas Eve, Scrooge is visited by the ghost of his old business partner Jacob Marley with a warning- change his ways or he’ll pay in the afterlife. \u00a0He is then visited by the spirits of Christmas past, present, and yet to come to help illuminate his choices, mistakes, and possibilities.
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In this day and age, Scrooge would probably be considered a great businessman hero, and have his own show on Fox News. \u00a0Fortunately in the days this was written charity was viewed favorably and greed looked down upon, so the story comes to a satisfying conclusion. \u00a0It is a classic tale, and this version of it is told and performed perfectly. \u00a0Seek it out for your Christmas viewing pleasure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“I have endeavoured in this Ghostly little book, to raise the Ghost of an Idea, which shall not put my readers out of humour with themselves, with each other, with the season, or with me.\u00a0 May it haunt their houses … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[190,86],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-a-christmas-carol-1984","category-movie-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1304"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1304\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1318,"href":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1304\/revisions\/1318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.postmoderntrashaeology.thezombified.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}