BRIAN DESMOND HURST

Bil’s rating (out of 5):  BBBBB

Alternate title:  Scrooge

United Kingdom/USA, 1951.  Renown Pictures Corporation.  Adaptation by Noel Langley, from the novel A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.  Cinematography by C.M. Pennington-Richards.  Produced by Brian Desmond Hurst.  Music by Richard Addinsell.  Production Design by Ralph W. Brinton.  Costume Design by Doris Lee.  Film Editing by Clive Donner.  

Probably the best rendition of Charles Dickens’s Christmas classic is this moody thriller starring Alastair Sim.  Ebenezer Scrooge is a crotchety miser of a man, he prefers eschewing Christmas spirit in favour of concentrating on business profits, himself responsible for adding the word ‘humbug’ to the English vernacular. A man like this is so beyond redemption that it prompts a supernatural intervention to get him to wake up to the world around him: three terrifying ghosts present themselves to him on Christmas Eve and give insight into his life, past, present and future alike. The heartwarming nature of the story is brought to life vividly, but the more terrifying aspects are also handled with perfect skill.