6 November 2009 10:24 PM, PST | Studio Briefing - Film News | See recent Studio Briefing - Film News news »
There's little harmony among critics assessing the latest cinematic version of Dickens' A Christmas Carol. (Actually, this one is called Disney's A Christmas Carol.) Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times, somewhat surprisingly, calls it "an exhilarating visual experience." Ebert, who has repeatedly denounced 3D technology in previous reviews (viewing a film through 3D glasses, he once remarked, is "like looking through a window that needs Windex.") remarks that director Robert Zemeckis is "one of the few directors who knows what he's doing with 3D." While he's reluctant to advise parents to take their kids to see it since it may be too frightening for them, he nevertheless concludes that it "has the one quality parents hope for in a family movie: It's entertaining for adults." A.O. Scott in the New York Times, while writing that Zemeckis goes overboard with the special effects near the end of the movie, says that he otherwise "sticks close to some of the sturdy virtues of the source material." And Chris Vognar in the Dallas Morning News regards the movie as "a worthy stab at mixing old and new, a vintage tale done with some fresh dazzle and a reminder that the movies can still bring the wow." On the other hand Joe Morgenstern in the Wall Street Journal condemns it as "a calamity." The story, he writes, feels "embalmed by technology." Likewise Carrie Rickey in the Philadelphia Inquirer calls it "visually immersive but emotionally uninvolving." As for the 3D technology, Claudia Puig in USA Today writes that Zemeckis "takes a story rich in nuance and renders it one-dimensional, more antic than thrilling." And Peter Howell in the Toronto Star comments that in this movie Zemeckis's use of 3D "only serves to further gild the lily. He's taken an immortal story and an A-list cast -- including Jim Carrey, Colin Firth and Gary Oldman -- and nearly smothered them with the digital equivalent of cellophane." »
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