Title:
A Christmas Carol
Format:
Silent film
Country:
UK
Production
company:
British and Colonial Films
Year:
1923
Length:
27 minutes
Setting:
Victorian
Background:
British and Colonial seems to have been a fairly
short-lived company, operating from 1908 until 1924, so this film came towards
the end of their life. Despite initially having operated from a basement flat,
however, they didn’t lack ambition – they made a docu-drama recreation of the
Battle of Waterloo with hundreds of extras at a cost of over £1000 in 1913, and
also experimented with early sound film techniques. They seem to have had
something of a line in documentaries and ongoing series of dramas, but did
occasionally reach back into literature for adaptations, as with this film.
Cast and crew:
Russell Thorndike, starring as Scrooge, was a man forever doomed to be followed by the words “brother of Sybil,” although he perhaps left his most
notable legacy as a writer rather than a performer, having created the Dr Syn
novels. His career did survive the silent era, however, and he does turn up in
small roles in some pretty notable films later on, including Olivier’s 1940s
versions of Henry V and Hamlet. He’s not bad as Scrooge here,
particularly in the earlier sections of the film which are the most faithful to
the book, although he isn’t always given the best material.
I was rather taken with the actor playing Fred, an
energetic performance, although confusingly I can’t quite work out who he is.
The cast list at the start of the film credits Forbes Dawson in the part – but
IMDb says Dawson plays Marley, and their biography for him does have him in his
sixties by the time of this film, which would obviously not be the man playing
Fred here.
Director Edwin Greenwood seems to have handled a number
of films in the 1920s but not beyond, and writer Eliot Stannard’s career
doesn’t seem to have outlasted Greenwood’s by very long, although he does seem
to have worked on a huge number of films in the 1920s if the IMDb can be
believed on that score.
 |
| "Take that! Bloody carol singers..." |
Underdone Potato:
As is commonplace in many adaptations, as Dickens
suggested we see Bob Cratchit attempting to warm his hands with the candle at
his desk. There is only one charity gentleman rather than two, and Scrooge goes
out of his workplace to give the poor old carol singer a right whack on the
head with a book!
Fred is all present and correct in his usual manner, but
there’s a deviation from the original story as we see him go home to Mrs Fred
and her sister, who are busy putting up the Christmas decorations, and relate
to them Scrooge’s declaration of Christmas as a “Humbug” in a manner more
usually seen in the Christmas Present section, when Scrooge can overhear them.
There’s no door knocker scene, but Marley is impressively
chained, and perhaps interestingly given how limited they were in the dialogue
they are able to include is given one of his original lines so little-used in
adaptations that I had forgotten until I checked that it is indeed part of the
original text – about “that blessed star
which led the Wise Men to a poor abode!”
Past:
Scrooge never goes to bed, but the Ghost of Christmas
Past turns up while he is still seated in his chair by the fire. He has the
snuffer cap, which looks somewhat more like a dunce’s cap here, but when he
takes it off he resembles nothing so much as a miniature version of William
Hartnell as the First Doctor from Doctor
Who.
We go straight to Belle’s breaking of the engagement –
the only vision from the past Scrooge is treated to in this version.
Present:
Unusually, the Ghost of Christmas Present is given a
white beard in this version, which together with his long, fur-trimmed coat
makes him even more closely resemble Father Christmas than he often does
anyway. This is probably quite fitting, however, as I am quite sure that the
character in Dickens’s original was at least somewhat informed by the
traditional British idea of Father Christmas, before the figure became almost
entirely conflated with the modern Santa Claus.
He doesn’t show Scrooge anything at all, though – he
simply appears, is rather jolly, says he inhabits the Christmases of the likes
of Bob Cratchit and Fred, and then says he won’t be persuaded to stay by
Scrooge, and promptly buggers off.
Yet to Come:
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come isn’t quite the full-on
spectre of Dickens, but he’s getting there. He more closely resembles a hooded
monk of some sort than he does Death, and it’s a clearly a very human hand
which emerges from his robe to point and beckon. According to the intertitles,
he also speaks – announcing himself as “the
Spirit of Christmas Future” to Scrooge when he first appears.
There is only a single vision shown here, however –
Scrooge’s grave. Which means he’s only seen two things all night, Belle leaving
him and his gravestone. Not exactly a packed evening.
What’s To-Day:
A sudden cut to Scrooge awaking in his chair by the
fireside works quite effectively. The main business of this section though is
Scrooge going to dinner at Fred’s – we as viewers arrive a little while before
he does, and join Mr and Mrs Fred secretly watching Topper trying to woo Mrs
Fred’s sister, before they all sit down to dinner together and then Scrooge
arrives and is warmly welcomed.
There’s a quite a nice shot at the end, where Scrooge and
Bob are framed by the fireside in the office enjoying their bowl of Smoking
Bishop together, constructed in such a way as to pretty much exactly match the
corresponding illustration by John Leech in the original edition.
 |
| "I am Father Christmas... No, sorry, I mean, I am the Ghost of Christmas Present..." |
Review:
Unlike the 1901 and 1910 versions, this adaptation could probably be easily
followed and understood by a viewer with no previous knowledge of the story
whatsoever. It is also possibly the first film version to include an
appreciable amount of Dickens’s original text, with the dialogue intertitles featuring
many of the best known lines in the most famous scenes - I can't speak for the 1913 version with great accuracy as I have only seen the 1926 re-release where the intertitles were certainly changed to at least some degree.
However, if you do
know the story, then this version will almost certainly be something of a
disappointment. Its concentration on the early part of the tale is admirable
and provides for a very faithful opening, but its short running time means this
comes at the cost of sacrificing much of the material from the point when the
ghosts begin appearing. The very short Christmas Present section seems a
particularly bizarre choice, but Yet to Come also suffers, as all Scrooge
really sees is his gravestone. We all know we’re going to die someday – that
shouldn’t come as a great shock to anybody. The point of all Scrooge sees in
the Carol is that he sees how his
death is received, and what kind of a man he is when he dies, not simply that
he sees he dies at all.
This may also be one of the only versions of the story
where Tiny Tim is omitted entirely. While Tim’s inclusion does often lead to
some of the more unfortunately treacly moments of many adaptations, to omit the
character entirely seems to me to be a mistake which robs the story of some of
its spirit.
There’s also a very similar issue to that which harms the
end of the 1910 Edison version, in that appears to Scrooge give nephew Fred a wadge
of cash, thus rather undermining the original story’s message and instead
suggesting that everything is all right if you have enough money. This is, I
think, something rather more cynical than what Dickens had in mind.
In a nutshell:
The cast and production values are good, and everything
up to and including Marley is quite faithful. After that point, however, they
simply run out of time and the whole thing rather deflates as they skim through
the remainder of the story. Not one of the best.
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