I went to see "A Christmas Carol" in 3D at the IMAX tonight. I have to say it was more out of a desire to see some a 3D film rather than because I wanted to see Jim Carrey's take on this Dickens classic. It is a story I am more than familiar with, my favourite version being "The Muppet's Christmas Carol" which stayed true enough to the story, whilst adding a large degree of humour to what can be a bit of a dry and sanctimonious story. I also liked the musical version, Scrooge, with Albert Finney and my old mucker Anton Rodgers (who sang the Oscar winning song "Thank you very much'). Any version that leaves you hoping that Tiny Tim will die is not a good one. In the Jim Carrey one I was very hopeful that that might happen. In fact I hoped that as Scrooge was carrying him shoulder high at the end of the film, Scrooge might throw Tiny Tim violently to the floor and stamp on his head shouting, "I was only pretending to love Christmas so that I could ensure your death definitely happened." And Tiny Tim's brains could have flown out towards the audience in 3D. It would have been awesome.
Because the film itself is pedestrian and doesn't really take you on the journey towards Scrooge's redemption. It is more concerned with showing off what you can do with 3D (though I understand you can see it in 2D, which would just be fucking rubbish I promise you), so a lot of the time they could have used telling the story is wasted with stupid scenes where Scrooge flies up towards the moon, or is flying round London, or (most stupidly of all) gets shrunk down to the size of a mouse to escape the ghost of Christmas yet to come who is pursuing him with a funereal coach and horses. There is some fun stuff with the 3D - the falling snow is good and made me want to brush it off my trousers - and whizzing through the London streets is OK the first time. But it's an odd half way house between a cartoon and reality and so when the characters look like the actors who are portraying them, as they do with Colin Firth and Gary Oldman, there is something deeply wrong and disturbing about the lifeless eyes, that don't quite focus on what they're meant to be looking at. Cartoons can often make you engage with the characters just as well as live actors, but this odd half way house makes it very hard to even see anyone as anything but slightly unnerving zombies. The trailers for other films didn't really quite cut it either, except for the one for "Alice in Wonderland" which looked a lot less shaky and odd.
As always with this story I felt sorry for Scrooge's partner Jacob Marley. Scrooge really does nothing to preempt his own salvation and without Marley and the other ghosts he would have done nothing to change his ways. But Marley had no Marley or ghosts to warn him about the consequences of his actions and is forced to roam the world in chains of his own making for all eternity. All after he's been nice enough to save old stupid Scrooge, who isn't even clever enough to realise that people are more important than money (if only for one day of the year). There should be a final scene where Marley's ghost is freed from his chains and gets to hug Scrooge. I'd rather Marley was saved than Tiny Tim. Especially in this version where he is a tiny cunt, who can't even say "God Bless us, every one" correctly.
The good bits of the 3D experience were enough to keep me entertained.
I was disappointed that they only gave us the special glasses as we came into the cinema and took them right off us as we were leaving (and had a special alarmed security gate to stop you stealing them). I wondered if this was because the glasses are not actually 3D glasses, but actually +1D glasses and will just add another dimension on top of whatever you happen to be looking at. So when looking at a 2D screen they add one dimension and make it 3D. But if you take them out into the real world (outside the specially scientifically created movie auditorium which has a force-field in it so they only work when pointed at the screen) then you will get plus one on top of the three dimensions you can normally see and witness the fourth dimension, which in my understanding of the concept is time itself (
Wikipedia will give you a more scientific understanding of what it really is). You'd be able to see the workings of time and presumably everything that had ever happened and would ever happen in the place you were standing. No wonder the staff are so keen to get those glasses off you. That would explode your mind.
But one day I am going to steal some glasses and see my own future. It will be ace.
But for now. Don't go and see "A Christmas Carol" in 2D. It does seem quite faithful to the book in the non-show off sequences, though that is possibly a mistake as the story really needs a few Muppets in it to take off. It does mean though that this Disney film has a bizarre bit where the Ghost of Christmas Present tells Scrooge that men of cloth have nothing to do with the true meaning of Christmas, which is quite subversive. Or at least would be if the true meaning of Christmas didn't turn out to be quite so syrupy and temporary and unworkable. And allows Tiny Tim to live.
