Popular reviews

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  Review by Rafael "Parker!!" Jovine ★★★★★ 6

  Ho! Ho! Ho! Its a Christmas List, yo!

  So when I got this movie, I was convinced I was about to watch The Muppets version, but by the end what I got was a Made-for-TV British version of the iconic Charles Dickens tale.

  And starting up, can we all just agree there’s no better actor to play Scrooge than George C. Scott? The man was born to play this character. From the persona he has built throughout the years as an actor to the way he looks with his height and face. And as expected, he wonderfully delivers both the a**hole side, but also his new self after he’s been taken through this ride with all the ghosts. You genuinely…

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  Review by Wesley R. Ball ★★★★

  George C. Scott's take on Charles Dickens' classic Christmas literary character is a personification that I've revisited religiously every Christmas eve for many years now. Time has brought a sort of familiarity to this TV version that makes me more fond of it than other variations. I won't say that this is definitively the best version of A Christmas Carol, but it's certainly still one of my personal favorites.

  Although this adaptation is oftimes cheap in its appearance (thanks to its age and lower budget television quality), Scott himself carries this film with his magnificent talent. His gruff voice and towering appearance gives a more hardened personality to this Ebeneezer Scrooge than other performances have. He's less cartoonish in his…

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  Review by Mister Cap ★★★★½ 6

  Mein Film – Adventskalender
  Türchen Nummer 1️⃣9️⃣

  HUMBUG!

  Ich liebe "Die Weihnachtsgeschichte" von Charles Dickens und habe den Verfilmungen sogar ein eigenes Ranking gewidmet. Es ist also nur logisch, dass diese Geschichte mehr als einmal in meiner Weihnachtsplaylist auftaucht.

  Für viele ist diese Version der unvergesslichen Geschichte von Charles Dickens "die ultimative Version" und es ist leicht, dem zuzustimmen. Es ist ein perfekter Film für die Weihnachtszeit oder wenn man einfach nur gute Laune haben möchte.

  Ebenezer Scrooge wird meisterhaft von George C. Scott gespielt und er bestätigt hier einmal mehr, dass er ein ausgezeichneter Schauspieler war. Er macht Scrooge zu einem unangenehmen und beängstigenden Charakter, kleine Details wie Blicke und bösartiges Lächeln unterscheiden Scotts Interpretation von allen anderen, die…

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  Review by voidember ★★★★ 6

  Arguably the darkest of the Christmas Carol adaptations for film, and one of my personal favorites, I watched this pretty much every year around the holidays as an adolescent, sometimes in the middle of the year as my mother is one of those people who watches Christmas movies year-round. It planted the kernel of my now deep affection for George C. Scott, whose voice is now the quintessential voice of Scrooge in my mind when I read Dickens' original text. What a great, legendary growl of a voice. And his laugh is the best.

  Aptly for a story titled A Christmas Carol, this one seems to understand how important  legitimate spookiness is to the story and Christmas hymns and carols…

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  Review by WraithApe ★★★ 7

  I have a special fondness for this version of Dickens's evergreen morality tale as it was shot on location in and around my hometown of Shrewsbury. It was fun picking out backdrops like Fish Street, Bear Steps, Town Walls, St Chad's and a bunch of other localities 99% of my readership will never have heard of. The interior scenes are all shot on set and they clearly used a lot of set work outside as well, embellishing the naturally ancient frontages of the medieval town with 19th Century period details. In a paltry attempt to convince the non-Salopian viewer it's set in London, there's a crude matte painting of St Paul's visible in the distance at the end of Fish…

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  Review by Lebowskidoo 🍿🛸 ★★★★½ 2

  Yet another version of Dickens' A Christmas Carol, only this time, a more faithful TV movie adaptation. Scrooge is more human and relatable, less of a miserable old fart.

  George C. Scott is really great as Scrooge. He plays him more like a man who has been wounded by life and has retreated from humanity. The entire production is pretty great. Having played the Ghost of Christmas Past myself in the sixth grade, I recognized entire scenes and lines taken directly from the source material. Many other versions omit or switch things up, this one sticks fairly close to the book. Charles Dickens would have approved.

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  Review by Issac ★★★★ 2

  Most people know the story, most people know the meaning behind the story, but I for one did not know the dark and heart aching elements that this Christmas story contains.
  I guess when I've seen previous versions of this movie, I mainly pay attention to the story itself and not the details.

  There's a lot of sadness, a lot of internal sadness. A lot of sadness that Is only caused by selfishness and a lot of people can relate to that (like me).
  I enjoyed this movie a lot for it's small details and for the creepiness it carried throughout the movie as it went on and for that, it's my favorite version of Dickens' classic story so far. Still many other versions to watch though.

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  Review by Julius ★★★★½ 3

  What I particularly like about this version is all the smiling in it. George C. Scott's Scrooge, rather than being constantly grumpy, takes joy in his own wit as he mocks Christmas, and delivers many of his darkly comic lines with a cynical grin.

  The spirits also get to smile more than they do in most adaptations; they have a serious duty, but that doesn't mean that can't enjoy torturing old Scrooge. I just love Edward Woodward's Ghost of Christmas Present's sarcastic smile as he throws Scrooge's own words back in his face.

  The discussions between Scrooge and The GOCP are among my favorite things in A Christmas Carol, and this version does more justice to them than I have seen in any other.

  It's also spooky and bleak when it needs to be, containing a fine Marley (disappointing scream, though) and nicely creepy Ignorance and Want.

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  Review by Helen_S ★★★★★ 2

  I'm not sure why I've never given this gorgeous TV film a perfect score before because it is <3 George C. Scott is probably my second fave Scrooge after Albert Finney and the most dapper! But my 2 favourite things about this version are the screeching notes played when Christmas future is on, it's eerie as fuck. And Woowar is the most nastiest bastard version of Christmas Present I've ever seen. The faces he pulls when he spits out Scrooge's lines back at him is unequalled. Love it!

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  Review by John Frankensteiner

  Big Dickens: A Christmas Carol Double Feature #2

  The greatest adaptation of A Christmas Carol simply due to George C. Scott’s Scrooge, which contains all the larger than life Scroogisms the story needs mixed in with his subtle take of what a broken man this must be to be the way he is. Scott’s Scrooge hates himself as much as he hates Christmas or anyone else around him. Scott’s face can’t help but always look like a man who has more regrets than years left on this earth, even as a child this was probably true. Even Scrooge’s redemption is filled with a depth of melancholy that you won’t find in any other take, the heartbreak that it took him…

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  Review by Jordan James Brooks 🤠 ★★★½

  It just seems like fate that George C. Scott would eventually get his shot at playing Scrooge. Perfectly cast, and one of the more notable adaptations. 

  Disagree that it’s the “darkest” version though. 1970’s Scrooge surely owns that space.

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  Review by Sally Jane Black 2

  It's been so long since I've seen or read a version of this that I actually found myself enjoying it again for the first time in ages. I tend to avoid versions of it simply because of the saturation of the story, but fuck it, it was on TV and the family copy of Die Hard has gone AWOL. This particular version has the worst TIny Tim I've ever witnessed, but it's got some fun visuals (Marley, the Ghost of Future Past) and great actors (Rees, Scott). Oh, and the Ghost of Christmas Present (ha) is bugfuck nuts.

  December count: 87/100