What the Dickens?

It is a sad fact that every year Hollywood feels compelled to ruin another old family favourite — both books and films. This season I’m in mourning for A Christmas Carol – the Dickens’ classic that’s been despoiled this year by Disney with the help of Jim Carey as Scrooge. It makes a mockery both of Dickens, and the decent, existing screen adaptations. There is animation, there is flying, and (dear god!) there is comedy. A far cry from the haunted moralisings of any serious rendition, this is not so much a story retold as a lesson untold. Where is the darkness here, where is the necessary fear? As a child at Christmas I watched the George C. Scott film (my personal favourite) every year, and every year it left me terrified for my soul and more awakened to my social conscience. The ghostly doorknocker, the clanging chains, the terrible figures of ignorance and want – this is the stuff of nightmares. It refuses to make light of avarice and selfishness and thank god for that.