Wait, what’s this? A review for a movie version of A Christmas Carol coming out the day after Groundhog Day? Way to drop the ball there, Tom!
Look, I only schedule one of these a day, I had a number of movies to finish off before they left HBO Max at the end of January, and this was only a little over an hour. I had time to squeeze it in. And while it isn’t the well-know musical version with Albert Finney or even the one with the Muppets that fans of the book claim is actually closest to the source material, it’s still from the looks of things the first feature-length Ameircan talkie version. That’s something.
At this point in time, I think it’s safe to say everyone knows the story of A Christmas Carol. After rotten old Christmas-hating miser Ebenezer Scrooge (Reginald Owen) gets a visit from the tormented ghost of his late business partner Marley, three ghosts representing the Christmases of Past, Present, and Yet-To-Come show up to convince Scrooge to change his ways, particularly by being better to his sole employee Bob Cratchit (Gene Lockhart) before Cratchit’s smallest child, the adorable waif Tiny Tim (Terry Kilburn) dies and Scrooge also dies unloved and unmourned. It works, and Scrooge wakes up to Christmas a kinder and more generous man.
Like I said, it’s a story everyone knows. There have been dozens of adaptations, and it’s a favorite to make light of on TV sitcoms and children’s cartoons since it has a nice basic moral at the center about treating people well at least around the holidays if not all the time. So, how could the people behind this version have made it stand out as different? That’s maybe not such a big deal when movies were only just beginning to have sound in them, but this one did do something I don’t think I’ve ever seen before, and that was to spend a good deal more time with Bob Cratchit and his wife (Gene Lockhart’s own wife Kathleen) and Scrooge’s nephew Fred (Barry MacKay). In fact, for a movie with such a short runtime, it takes a bit to finally get to Scrooge, instead showing Fred playing in the snow with some kids that include Tiny Tim and his brother and later some more time showing Bob buying food for the Christmas dinner.
Theoretically, there’s nothing wrong that, but the charm of A Christmas Carol has always been Scrooge and his journey of redemption. And while those scenes do mostly play out well–if a bit truncated since this movie didn’t seem to have a large budget enough to show, for example, Scrooge’s lost love or the elaborate Christmas parties he enjoyed as a lad–I am not sure I wanted to see Bob teach kids how to pack a snowball before it predictably goes wrong when he doesn’t know the old man he’s going to toss it at is his boss or Fred romancing his fiancee. Bob is basically just a good husband and father in any adaptation, and Fred is, well…Fred. These diversions take away from the story that anyone who tunes into any version of A Christmas Carol really wants to see, namely the ghosts teaching Scrooge a lesson on the importance of being a good person as symbolized by Christmas celebrations.
That said, I will add that this movie does feature the screen debut of Gary and Kathleen Lockhart’s only daughter as one of the Cratchit children. She’s unbilled, but she did grow up and keep acting well into her old age. Yeah, future Lassie and Lost in Space actress June Lockhart got her start here. Just don’t ask me which of the Cratchit children she is. The only one who ever matters is Tiny Tim, and I don’t know that any adaptation ever showed why that kid of all people touched Scrooge’s heart. Then again, I’m not sure any kid actor could make Tiny Tim that special anyway. I might have to read the book someday and see what sets him apart from the others. In the meantime, this was decent, but there are far better versions floating around.
Grade: C
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