A Christmas Carol (2020)

New in cinemas.

There is nothing that says Christmas more than a new film adaptation of Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. Dickens’s story is, of course, pretty indestructible, which comes with a challenge, can you do something new without it been a gimmick or breaking the very essence of this classic story?

Step forward Jacqui and Dave Morris’s wonderfully original mix of cinema, dance, silent film and animated retelling. The story is told through the imagination of a young girl as she watches her brother and sister perform the story using their puppet theatre while Grandma (Sian Phillips) reads the story.

What unfolds is an adaptation that is as bleak as it is beautiful. The dance element has character’s moving gracefully around the screen amongst fantastically atmospheric sets, while they are narrated via a fine voice cast with Simon Russell Beale’s Scrooge supported by Martin Freeman, Carey Mulligan and Daniel Kaluuya among many others.

Alongside the wonderful on screen performances are intertwined powerful animations, often desribing the very darkest and bleakest parts of Dickens’s world and unfortunately remind you of how, even 150 years later, we are still dealing with many similar problems.

What this adaptation has managed is to bring something different to the classic tale, I was drawn in immediately loving the movement of the characters and its sumptuous look. Once you get used to the narration over the top of the movement of the performers you forget about it and are absorbed by the story as with any good telling of A Christmas Carol.

The only downside for me, was the empty screen I watched it in, this highly original on screen experience deserves an audience, doing an excellent job of bringing a dance inspired performance piece to the screen and offering a fresh and interesting way of telling this most festive of stories.