A Christmas Carol (1997)
It’s interesting that so many adaptations of Charles Dickens’ iconic seasonal story are brought to us via the medium of animation. Naturally, this is a far more economical means of depicting the story with its period detail and supernatural elements, compared to a live action production. However, for an animated version of A Christmas Carol to work successfully, it needs three things. An innovative and striking production design, robust voice acting and a screenplay that keeps the core themes while offering significance difference compared to prior adaptations. You’ll find all of these elements in Richard Williams’ 1971 animated short. Sadly they’re conspicuously absent from the 1997 version. Despite the presence such talents as Tim Curry, Ed Asner and Whoopi Goldberg, this is a distinctly arbitrary animated film. Considering that the screenplay was written by Jymn Magon who has years of experience working for Disney, I had hoped this would be better endeavour.
A Christmas Carol presents a very non-specific realisation of Dickensian London. The costumes seem more Edwardian in style and the city is a little too contemporary in design. Scrooge (Tim Curry) is depicted in a very generic way, complete with long nose, angular features and balding head. He also has a canine companion named Debit who acts as a comic foil and tempers some of the more sinister elements of the story. The film sports a rather lurid colour scheme, with characters wearing lots of bright red and green. The various spirits that visit scrooge deviate from the source text in their depiction. The Ghost of Christmas Past is presented as a street urchin, which I thought was quite a creative touch. The Ghost of Christmas Present is voiced by Whoopi Goldberg so the spirits gender and ethnicity reflect those of the actor. And then there are the songs. Yes, this is yet another musical adaptation filled with indifferent songs that simply fill the gaps in the proceedings. None of them stay with you.
At 72 minutes this version of A Christmas Carol does not outstay its welcome. Despite being rather uninspired it is broadly tolerable, although I appreciate that such a statement is damning with faint praise. Occasionally there are some minor details lifted directly from the source text, which I always look to see. This time round it is Jacob Marley’s face appearing in the painted tiles that surround the fireplace in Scrooge’s lodgings. The film also has a few creative ideas, such as a Jacob Marley that looks more like Theodore Roosevelt than a ghost. I also liked that Scrooge finds common ground with Tiny Tim through their finding escape through books and mutual love of the novel Robinson Crusoe. If you can tune out the songs and concentrate on the animated sequences that accompany them, as well as overlook the rather pointless inclusion of the dog Debit, then this version of A Christmas Carol may be of interest to fellow completists. Casual viewers will be better off seeking out a more accomplished adaptation.
