Children’s Pastors MOVIE REVIEW: Christmas Carol

By Pastor Rocky in Arts and Culture on 12/1/09

This weekend I watched the new Christmas Carol movie staring Jim Carey.  Like most of you I was led to believe it would be a funny rendition.  The truth is it is a stark, earnest, and frightful portrayal of this classic book.  While Jim Carey’s spastic gestures and incredibly elastic facial expressions do at times lend the movie the air of comedy, the manic nature of the characters led them a frightful air.  I watched this movie with my nephew and even the character of scrooge scared him.  The first of the three spirits is shown as a semi-transparent candle with Carey’s face.  This is the oddest of the deviations from the classic movies.  This character more than any other in this film falls unbelievably flat.  I do not know what they are going for but unless it was an attempt to engender slight indifference to the character than they did not succeed.  The second of the ghosts was actually my favorite though his manic nature lent him a air of unpredictability that made him outright intimidating.  This movie contains lots of 3d pop out at you moments that are startling and hard to predict.  I actually appreciate those moments though so I count that as a plus.  This story also restores some of the less known scenes from the actual dickens novel such as the trail of ghosts and the scene of scrooges assistant crying over the body of Tiny Tim.  I actually think this was a fairly good version of Christmas Carol but I would not recommend it for families of young children.  If your kids are not at least 10 years old or accustomed to scary movies I would avoid this film.  As an adult or older youth I think it is worth watching.  I give this a 7/10 STARS.

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