Rating:

This is one of my all time favorite Christmas movies. It’s on a short list of films which have inspired me during the holidays since I was in short pants, and I was watching it before I could even get most of the themes and jokes involved.

Now, you may be wondering just how many adaptations of Charles Dickens’ holiday classic have been made. The answer is 14,212. And this is one of the better ones.

Why has the classic story been so popular among playwrights and film directors over the centuries? The answer is pretty simple, and it’s because it’s one hell of a fun story to adapt and make your own.

The basic storyline is pretty much set in stone–a grouchy man is visited by three ghosts who show him his past, present, and future life, and it makes him rethink his morals and ideals. BUT! You can pretty much change the time period and persona of your main character–your “Scrooge”–to fit whatever story you want to tell. And once you change the identity of that main character, the whole meat of your storyline is up for interpretation.

And of course Scrooged is the perfect example of this. Instead of a crotchety old 19th-century man doing god knows what and counting gold coins, Bill Murray plays Frank Cross, a young, ruthless television executive with only himself on his mind (and who has a huge sign in his office which reads, “Cross (k-ros) n. - Something you nail people to.”)

He’s visited by the three ghosts, and every time he’s reinserted into his present-day life, he goes a little more crazy, and it’s great. The ghosts themselves, however, are significantly less great.

The ghost of Christmas Past (David Johanson) is depicted as a gruesome NYC cabby, and Johanson’s character is pretty much dead in the water. At times, he can make the scenes unbearable as he speaks, even as these events from Murray’s past are the most touching in the entire film. Karen Allen, on the other hand, as Cross’ jilted lover Claire, is a delight. She’s just as warm and spirited as a female lead can get, particularly in the flashbacks, and the audience wants to fall back in love with her just as much as Frank does.

The ghost of Christmas Present is Carol Kane, who, for some reason, is a fairy. A fairy who hits people. I have no idea why this theme was chosen for this ghost, but it doesn’t work, and it apparently, along with her grating voice, was mistaken for “character.”

But the ghost of Christmas Future, whoo boy — that’s a fine ghost right there. He looks like Death, only inside his hood he has a TV screen for a face and the disembodied souls of the damned imprisoned in his rib cage. I dare you to watch this third sequence, in which Frank sees his assistant’s troubled son put into a mental asylum and experiences his own cremation, and not be terrified. And more importantly, not get the same message that Frank does: life comes to an end, and it’s too short in the first place — do what you can with what you have, while you have it.

So we all know that he has a change of heart and makes amends with the world, as all Scrooges do, but the climax of this film sees Murray giving one of the most impassioned, genuine monologues about faith, hope and charity we’ve seen to his friends and family — and everyone else in the world — via his network’s Christmas Eve program. It’s enough to bring tears to any bleeding heart’s eye, it really is.

If You Hated This, You Will Also Totally Hate:

• Mickey’s Christmas Carol
• Bah, HumDuck! A Looney Tunes Christmas
• A Christmas Story
• 1408: I Should Be a Head of Development
• How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000)