A Christmas Carol

My favorite film thus far of the Fall/Holiday Season undoubtably goes to Robert Zemeckis' A Christmas Carol. Zemeckis(director of Forrest Gump and the Back to the Future series) and his animation team (who brought us The Polar Express and Beowulf) master their craft of uber-cartoons for an update on the Christmas classic. And to add further awesomeness to the film... it was in 3-D! Jim Carrey plays the main role (and a hand full of other roles) as SCROOGE.

Being that Christmas is my favorite Holiday (I have begun spinning the Xmas records already) and loving 90% of the Holiday movies that come out, I wasn't going to miss this. Plus being a fan of 3-D movies, I was totally in. I just hoped that Zemeckis would do a decent job with the story. I love the Charles Dickens' tale, but quite frankly the old movies are just... too OLD! There are some movies that last the test of time, but the old renditions of the story definitely needed an update.

This version more than sufficiently delivers! The animation works to the fullest and accentuates each part of the story (the three different ghosts). I expected the film to be extremely jolly yet also dark when necessary. Overall, the movie is a sure Christmas magic! Whereas we grew up on classics like It's A Wonderful Life, Christmas Vacation, The Christmas Story and Home Alone- kids nowadays will tune into Jim Carrey's The Grinch, Elf and now this animated update. I especially loved Gary Oldman deliver a great CRATCHIT performance. Visually, the opening scene is one of the best pieces of animative cinematography(which may not actually be a real thing) I have ever scene.

Definitely a family friendly film (yet scarey at times for the young ones). If you can stomach it, I would 100% recommend seeing it in 3-D. I was fortunate to see the new AVATAR trailer in 3-D which was beyond amazing.

Loving the animation of this film, I am now inspired to rent POLAR EXPRESS. I didn't read that book growing up so I didn't rush to the theaters to see it. But I do love the animation Zemeckis and his team bring. I recently read that next Zemeckis plans to use the same animation techniques to update The Beatles' YELLOW SUBMARINE. Needless to say, I can't wait for that.

This is a must see from now until Christmas. I may go again.

Look for a few more movie posts this upcoming weekend. The list of movies to see this weekend consists of : New Moon, 2012, Boondock Saints II and The Blind Side. I doubt I will see all four.