Thought
Provoking and Mature A Christmas Carol (2019)
by
Kristin Battestella
To
allow himself rest in the afterlife, the deceased Jacob Marley
(Stephen Graham) aides The Ghosts of Christmas Past (Andy Serkis),
Present (Charlotte Reily), and Future (Jason Flemyng) in orchestrated
a change for good in his soulless, corrupt business partner Ebenezer
Scrooge (Guy Pearce). Scrooge's bitter ways effect the health,
happiness, and welfare of his clerk Bob Cratchit (Joe Alwyn) and his
wife Mary (Vinette Robinson), but confronting Scrooge's horrible life
may not be enough to redeem the miser...
The
2019 BBC miniseries A
Christmas Carol produced by
Ridley Scott (Prometheus)
and Tom Hardy (Venom)
is a darker imagining of the perennial Charles Dickens tale with
episodic chapters
originally called “The Human Beast,” “The Human Heart,” and
“A Bag of Gravel” airing stateside on FX as one
three hour event. Director Nick Murphy (The
Last Kingdom) and writer
Stephen Knight (Peaky
Blinders) obviously
have more time to fill than the more traditional, idyllic, paired
down tellings. Rather than the same old saccharin “God bless us,
everyone!” these days viewers expect television to bring on the
relatable Victorian bitterness. We often glorify the past, but this A
Christmas Carol doesn't
underestimate an audience intimately familiar with weighing every
action by gain mentalities and who you know and how much money you
have getting you anywhere in life uphill struggles, abuses, and
humiliation. Urination, grave desecration, bastards and F bombs
immediately set this adult tone before ominous winds, crows, eerie
graveyards, and a frosty ethereal London 1843. Church bells,
purgatory supernatural, and almost Shakespearean asides accent the
six feet under coins on the eyes and no rest in peace as hellish
forges, chains, and swinging coffins invoke a much more grim penance.
Phantom sleighs dragging the chained behind lead to echoes between
the counting house and the spirit realm. Rattling in the fireplace
and cutaways to the point of view from an empty chair realistically
lay the forthcoming between worlds – embracing the Victorian off
kilter faerie parallel rather than just a sudden, mere holiday
intervention as is often portrayed. Time is taken in A
Christmas Carol with
hand washing a la Lady Macbeth and ghostly versus guilt ticking
clocks. Hypocritical analysis digs deeper than humbug archetypes, and
great horror imagery sets off the familiar but transposed text
delivered deftly and naturally without any try hard ye oldeth.
Villainous silhouettes grow darker when we get the famous workhouses,
prisons, and let them die disturbing. Shadows and black horses take
the place of the locomotive on the stairs as other animal kindnesses
born out of cruelty and hopeful lantern flashes contrast the creaking
gate and ghostly door knocker. While most adaptations have a quick
start or only run eighty minutes themselves, here it takes an hour
before we even get to the Scrooge and Marley encounter. This A
Christmas Carol simmers
and broods, for these apparitions have been a long time coming with
thumps in the night, groaning houses, clicking locks, and guilty
consequences. Chilling reasons for that scarf usually around Marley's
jaw become macabre shocks as A
Christmas Carol takes
the hallmarks of a story that's tough to do wrong and runs with the
one on one encounters, twofer deliveries, and fiery flashbacks.
Faulty subcontracts and bribing officials led to bloody workhouse
disasters, gas explosions, and coal mine collapses while Scrooge
passed the blame and forged those symbolic chains.
The
refreshing script simplifies the Dickensian wordiness yet we do get
some of the sardonic undigested beef quips amid self-aware glances at
the camera and eternity spent in a forest of abandoned Christmas
trees and forgotten childhood memories. An act
of kindness said to be given to someone in pain is rejected as the
abused perpetuate abuse, dealing in greed and people as commodities.
Those scarred mentally and physically by the cruel, cost cutting
overseers rightfully call upon revenge like a reverse It's
A Wonderful Life orchestrating
this spiritual comeuppance. Snowfall and ash in the air mix as other
realms and childhood fears merge with violent canes, creepy
singsongs, and pets caught in the chilling crossfire in a house that
can't afford another mouth to feed. Hiding behind the bed curtains is
used to frightful effect as A
Christmas Carol shows
what the book implies yet leaves nasty suggestions to the shadows.
Hope, however, can be found small as a mouse, big as a camel, or even
in fanciful book illustrations come to life to save a boy's mind from
his torturous reality. Unfortunately, people are only worried about
themselves. Gifts are just unwritten debts and unprofitable
affections. These spirits force us to relive the darkest moments of
the picture we paint so we may unlearn the ills that have shaped who
we are. Here A
Christmas Carol feels
timely and modern, layering the
past
with disturbing familiar faces and real world terrors that harden a
boy's heart and break our Christmas spirit. Magical deflections,
pleas to go home, and facing the horrors combine for superb duality
and visualizations as children may or may not see spirits and two of
the same character appear in the same place at once. Loom factories
become massive calculators in an industrial fantasy hitting home the
cold hard numbers. Tragedy for many is opportunity for the few, and
that's just good business to see pounds instead of people and exploit
their weaknesses accordingly. Shameful humiliations done on Christmas
Day are born not out of desire, but agonizing experiments testing the
solemn limits of what good people will do for money. Viewers
contemplate how far A
Christmas Carol will
go in examining the the value of human virtue, and Merry Christmas
greetings are said for all the wrong reasons – justifying the
prayers, warnings, and curses that one day the truth will look us in
the mirror. Mining survivors unite in memorial choirs, and the poor
make up the difference with happiness and love instead of itemizing
priceless intangibles. Halos at the altar suggest salvation, but
admitting regret or that love came too late to stop hatred isn't
enough against chilling figures in the dark, haunting drownings,
cracking ice, and death shrouds. Tolling bells and heartbeats
announce the fatal consequences as we accept our deserved fate. For
all the spirited meddling, it is up to us to change and act for the
benefit of others without expectation of reward as A
Christmas Carol concludes
in full Dickensian compassion.
The
First Chapter of A Christmas Carol is excellent as is the
second. However, when expanding such a short novella, the balance is
bound to be uneven. Here Christmas Past is featured for almost an
hour and a half – leaving twenty minutes for The Ghost of Christmas
Present and only ten minutes for The Future. After such depth with
The Past, viewers wonder why Andy Serkis just didn't play one
composite spirit? Upon moving on from him with only forty-five
minutes left, suddenly this A Christmas Carol is rushed,
running out of time, and on the same pace as any other adaptation.
Onscreen Christmas Eve 1843 openings don't match Marley's 1842 grave
marker and the supposed seven years since his passing, but nor do the
1851 death dates. The melancholy focus will tire some audiences, yet
the quick finale feels like this should have been longer – a four
hour, two night event. All that Past just opened Scrooge up so The
Present can show warmth by making him wear a scarf and tinge his
heart in a third of the time? The often excised Ali Babi brings a
dash of childhood wonder into such grim, but making The Ghost of
Christmas Present a woman to soften up Scrooge negates the
progressive gender change and defeats the purpose of ditching young
Scrooge's for love or money choice. While losing the seemingly
essential festive Fezziwig works wonders, the exclusion of
eavesdropping on Nephew Fred's is a missed opportunity when you've
made his mother The Ghost of Christmas Present. The Past repeatedly
tells Scrooge this is not a game – long after Scrooge stops making
passive aggressive asides – but Fred's mocking his uncle and
Scrooge's family resentment would have fit in well with this bitter A
Christmas Carol. Viewers begin to notice famous wording and
elements missing. Did we skip an episode? Did the editor loose a
reel? My favorite moment with Ignorance and Want is also excised when
the decrepit child motifs would have fit these acerbic themes, and
the casting lots on the bed clothes bargaining is another profiting
on death horror that is surprisingly absent as if the writers simply
didn't finish adapting the fourth stave of the book or the production
plum ran out of time and money. At times A Christmas Carol doesn't
seem to trust what it has in these exceptional performances and the
timeless source material, adding in extra dialogue when looking at
the camera directly implies the fourth wall is already broken and the
spiritual work is coming for us next. Some truly good or innocent and
in tune characters are said to see the usually invisible Scrooge and
company – a haunting provocation wonderfully bringing this seeming
radical A Christmas Carol right back to Dickens, for “I am
standing in the spirit at your elbow.”
Occasionally
Guy Pearce (Brimstone)
looks top hat debonair as Ebenezer Scrooge, but the greased hair,
liver spots, curled lip, and scratchy voice are look foul decrepit to
match the black ink said to run through his veins. According to
Scrooge, gifts are falsely sought and dressed in ribbons to create
artificial happiness and fake grins. No one really means their
tidings of joy, and the December 25 dates, wise men, and snow in
Palestine “facts” are just more perpetuated lies revealing who we
presume to be and who we really are on Christmas or any other day. If
such yule transformations were true, then why aren't we such lambs
every day with one day of misery to say what we really mean? Scrooge
remains isolated in his office, looking out his window on the noisy
world as time is taken for his extrapolated soliloquies on pretense
and humbug. However, even the camera pulls back when he approaches,
recoiling at his despicable holiday honesty. Scrooge is obsessed with
counting, an OCD itemizing when he's frustrated by poor fools and
pesky specters. After talking to himself and almost missing Marley,
Scrooge is angry at the deceased's appearance, defiant, and regrets
nothing. Although put in his place early with scary past
confrontations, he uses his history to justify why he is this way but
not that he needs to change. Shrewd Scrooge buys liquidating business
under price before selling them at true value and smiles at the
wheeling and dealing done in his prime. He even tells The Ghost of
Christmas Past to write off a new coat as a business expense if
subjects keep clawing and crying on his robe. Repeatedly
rationalizing every profit over human cost and exploiting all
opportunities despite any anguish, Scrooge revels in dangling the
keys to his safe before the desperate. Once defensive and refusing to
look, he grows ashamed of his actively cruel behavior in an excellent
dual performance contrasting past and present Scrooge side by side.
Scrooge practices positive greetings in the mirror but looks more
creepy doing so. He doesn't know how to change even if he admits he
may do things differently if given the chance, for it was his own
innocence sold that spurred this solidarity with money. Scrooge
regrets and apologizes, trying to break the spirit rules and
interfere yet he refuses redemption. He accepts he was wrong and
deserves to not be forgiven as softer hair and nicer skin suggest his
revitalization. Scrooge runs through the street like George Bailey,
closing his business and giving away money. Payoffs won't make
everything right but he has to start being a better person somewhere.
Don't we all? Although I wish we heard some of the traditional
wording from him – and I want to make his long dress coat – once
again I ask where the awards are for Guy Pearce. Sometimes, he also
looks like Sean Bean here. I hadn't noticed this before and now I
demand they play brothers in future yearly gothic holiday
adaptations. Van Helsing, Jekyll and Hyde, yes please.
Pleasepleaseplease please!
Instead
of just saying he sat beside Scrooge and tried to reach him, Stephen
Graham's (This is England)
restless Jacob Marley has much more to do. Marley anchors the
transitions between counting house and underworld as the realms bleed
through like a double negative. He wants his own absolution and needs
Scrooge to get him such Clarence-esque wings, deepening the potential
penance via his own encounters with the Ghost of Christmas Past.
Anguished Marley thinks he'll be stuck in purgatory forever if his
redemption hinges on Scrooge. He believes their reality was a choice,
also appearing after
the spirits to admit how wrong they were in life, and it's
fascinating to see his realization as the culmination rather than the
impetus of A Christmas
Carol. Andy Serkis (Lord
of the Rings)
looks like an undead, ancient Santa as the Ghost of Christmas Past –
a cranky minder of souls perpetually burning forgotten holiday hopes.
The character also appears as the evil Scrooge Senior in pure horror
torment as well as the literary friend Ali Baba in bittersweet
moments. His eerie hood is not the sentimental sprite we expect, and
the dried wreath on his head carries a crown of thorns, Christ-like
innocence lost. Instead of the distinguishing cap, a zoetrope hat
casts past shadows on the wall in an excellent visualization of the
then-new to see the old. Weary over Scrooge's excuses, The Past sends
progressive Ghost of Christmas Present Charlotte
Riley (The Take)
in the guise of sister Lottie Scrooge in a lovely change again
deserving of much more than repetitive family exposition and
narrating already seen actions from characters that could have said
everything themselves. Logical Lottie understands Scrooge's past
pain, combining the scientific and sensitive to confront Scrooge
before the mouth sewn shut, grave digger-esque Jason Flemyng (X-Men:
First Class) as The Ghost
of Christmas Future enters tolling a broken bell. He's said to be the
most terrifying of the spirits and the one who ultimately decides
Scrooge's fate, but unfortunately, he doesn't really appear to do
anything but provide the disturbing Tiny Tim fate. The Past had
equally frightening moments, and The Future merely disappears as
Scrooge ultimately amends on his own.
Joe
Alwyn (also in Mary Queen of
Scots with
Pearce) doesn't really
stand out for me among the numerous lookalike blonde boy band type
actors abound these days. His Bob Cratchit seems somewhat young,
weak, and ineffectual, but that is fitting for an overworked father
trying to keep his meager family together. Scrooge thinks four lumps
of coal is more than reasonable despite his clerk's frozen ink and
continues to rag on him for a word misspelled once five years ago.
Exasperated Bob insists he doesn't get angry and do his work
perfectly to spite Scrooge. He doesn't hate his employer and remains
kinds to Scrooge, asking if he is himself when they have such
surprisingly frank conversations on this peculiar Christmas Eve. Bob
has to toe the line between passive aggressive asides and really
talking back or standing up to his boss. He tells Scrooge he knows
indeed how precarious his situation is, making us wonder why
“situation” as synonymous for “job” fell out of terminology
when the family to feed or ill health reasons why one toils should be
paramount. Vinette Robinson's (Sherlock)
Mary Cratchit is frazzled and snippy, making excuses to her husband
and sketching stories for Tiny Tim because they have no money for
books. Only having two little Cratchits and a relative aptly named
Martha tightens the familial focus, and Mary resorts to terrible
secrets and forgoes her pride in a desperate need to save her son.
She prays to be forgiven for what she has to do and asks Jesus to
turn his head over such blackmail and lies. The holiday means Mary
has to revisit one terrible Christmas every year, repeatedly going
outdoors rather than face the congested weight and manifested guilt
as the spiritual influences come full circle. Rather than then the
usual poor but happy brevity, A
Christmas Carol develops
The Cratchits as conflicted people, embodying
how the one who has to power to alleviate their suffering can cause
more oppression without having to lay a creepy hand on anyone.
The
titular icicle script ekes out the ghostly etching with a cold nib to
match the frosted windows and meager candle flame frigid. Snow
abounds alongside carriages, street lamps, sleighs, ice skating, and
crowded streets. However, there are precious little signs of
Christmas in A Christmas Carol. No
holly, few wreaths or plain garlands, no old fashioned merry, and the
only jolly comes in brief carol notes and fiddle melodies cut short.
While the night time blue tint is easier to see, the over saturation
may be intentionally noticeable and otherworldly. There are also some
unnecessary swooping pans over the cobblestone streets but
fortunately these are only used early on to set the Londontown bustle
versus the paranormal underbelly. Stage-like blocking, lighting
schemes, and careful attention to detail visualize characterizations
with gleams of light shining through the windows as natural, hopeful
rays or framing dark silhouettes as needed. The counting house office
is divided between a brighter front and a darker back office with a
wall of ledgers between rooms that the clerk must repeatedly go
around to talk to Scrooge. Intercut foreshadowing between worlds
leaves onscreen space for characters on another plane, subtly
establishing Scrooge and Marley's partnership even if the men are
technically not together in the same scene. Echoing footsteps, bells,
chimes, and creaking invoke period as well as horror amid hellish red
fireplaces and disturbing imagery. Pox marks and sullen pallors match
the tattered gloves and shabby bonnets on the poor while slightly
more refined styles set the wealthy apart with top hats, ascots,
waistcoats, pocket watches, and frock coats. A Christmas Carol
looks the early Victorian part
without relying on the expected women's silhouette thanks to
fantastical cloaks, steampunk touches, and choice special effects.
Dark upon dark schemes set off the horror visuals and cave ins as the
fog and frigid grow inside as well as out in the largely empty
interiors. Groaning walls and a growing bed are ominous
without being overbearing. The optical tricks are simple with slow
zooms or camera cuts to where a spirit might be, leaving the chill up
the spine carried by one's looking over his shoulder and frightful
reaction shots – as the scares should be.
Certainly
there are more genteel family friendly adaptations of A Christmas
Carol, and this decidedly darker
spin won't be for those seeking any lighthearted Dickensian comforts.
It also takes planning to settle in for the whole three hour block
stateside. Although the chapter title cards are retained and once
we're on this retrospective journey it's tough to stop, having had
the original UK episodic format would solve the dreary, dragging
complaints. I watched this multiple times to pause and take notes,
and there are more insights the more you watch. Despite an
uneven weakness rushed in the latter half, the redemption arc fits
this darker tone. Here there's no overnight exuberance, and it makes
the viewer consider how fast and superficial other interpretations
now seem when the longer television format allows for such grim,
thought provoking extrapolation. It leaves one wanting more of this A
Christmas Carol, and it's
unabashed look in the mirror is watchable beyond the holiday season –
paralleling the words herein to be the best person we can be daily
rather than just faking it at Christmas.
