I’m currently reading an annotated edition of “A Christmas Carol.” Conservatives like to claim that there’s a war on Christmas now? They don’t know from wars on Christmas. According to the book’s lengthy intro, back in the 17th Century England’s Roundhead government basically banned Christmas celebrations. Dickens’ book is largely credited for reigniting Christmas festivities after several centuries of very muted celebrating.
AMC just repeated the magnificent George C. Scott version of the classic tale. If you haven’t seen it, seek it out on DVD.
Many happy returns of the day to all, and to all a good night.
PAD
ā¢ 
I like the way monochrome looks, in case you haven’t figured that out from earlier. The best use I’ve seen of it lately is Corpse Bride, where the world of the living is all grey and black, but the world of the dead looks like Mardis Gras threw up. Still, I know people who won’t even touch anything black and white. Including books, for that matter. Shame, that. Look at films from Sim’s Christmas Carol to the Maltese Falcon to any of the classic Universal horror films. Color would kill half the atmosphere, because they’d have to be lit differently to SHOW the color. Totally changes the effect.
Just out of curiousity, now that we’ve talked up our favorite interpretations, what’re everyone’s(or every one’s) LEAST favorite?
Actually, Bill, the ones that fade to Magenta really bug me. But the ones that fade to Columbia are okay in my book….what? You mean, Magenta’s a COLOR? Who knew?
Fraser said, “the Winkler version is “An American Christmas Carol…”
Yes, now I remember. So the bit with Winkler “meeting” either Dickens or Scrooge might have been from the introduction to the movie, or something like that.
I suspect I watched that particular movie to see if Winkler was able to shed all traces of the Fonz, the only role I’d seen him play at that time.
Or maybe there was nothing else on. Still don’t remember much about the movie. I have absolutely no memory of any of the ghosts (or anyone else) wearing a disco suit and gold chains. One would think such an image would stick with you.
On the other hand (and still Christmas related), I still remember every single word of the novelty songs What Can You Get a Wookie for Christmas When He Already Owns a Comb? and R2D2, We Wish You a Merry Christmas, both released on the same 45 record in 1978 or 1979.
God help us, every one.
Rick
P.S. I agree that a film meant to be in black and white should not be colorized. I wonder if anyone will ever colorize the black and white portions of Pleasantville (or worse yet, The Wizard of Oz), completely missing the point of why those scenes were filmed that way.
At least some DVDs of colorized films contain the original black and white version as well. The Mark of Zorro (1940) with Tyrone Power and Basil Rathbone is one such example. I don’t like that someone colorized that film, but at least it’s not our only option.
Speaking of colorized films, and the sometimes poor process of colorization, Elijah Cook, Jr. was interviewed in Starlog about 20 years ago (as part of the occasional “Guests of Trek” feature), and the subject of colorized films came up. One of his early films was The Maltese Falcon, which may or may not have been the film he referred to when he made this observation (paraphrased from memory) about the colorized version: “‘I didn’t know my eyes were brown,’ chuckled the blue-eyed actor.”
One of the 3 Stooges films (or maybe a Marx Brothers film? I wish I could remember) was colorized with incredible attention to detail. They even went through old warehouses and found a lot of the original props from the movie. That way they found out that a stove was actually yellow and colored it properly in the colorized version.
Then someone pointed out that it was only painted yellow because that made a good shade on the black and white film and it looked ridiculous.
The Puritans who helped colonize the pre-United States wanted to ban Christmas entirely. You know — those folks who were *major* influences upon the Founding Fathers when they were writing the Constitution — or at least, according to the same crowd who believe there’s a “war on Christmas”…
Wildcat
I suspect I watched that particular movie to see if Winkler was able to shed all traces of the Fonz, the only role I’d seen him play at that time.
It’s funny but almost every role I’ve seen Winkler in post-Fonz he has been as far away from Fonzy as possible. He makes a great milquetoast and and in real life seems to be a pretty pleasant, mild manner fellow. It’s a mark of good acting skills and a good eye from the casting director that they looked at him and knew they had their Fonzy.
Ack, they got Benazir Bhutto today. Everyone saw it coming but still…
Ack, they got Benazir Bhutto today.
That’s a Very Bad Thing. Things were already bad enough there lately. š
Things were already bad enough there lately.
Doesn’t help that Bush backed her.
The way this plays out could be very …for lack of a better word… interesting.
Doesn’t help that Bush backed her.
I think we can give Bush a pass on this one…there’s no way that the Al Queada types were going to allow her to assume power.
The ruling classes of Pakistan are wildly out of favor with a huge and dangerous segment of their population.
My biggest worry doesn’t directly involve us; if India gets nervous at the prospect of nuclear armed anarchy at its border it might do something about it and the options aren’t very good.
I think we can give Bush a pass on this one…
Sorry, didn’t intend it as a criticism of him (for once). Just that our country backing her could cause some additional repercussions.
Oh yeah, it definitely could. We’re in a bad position–we want to support democracy in Pakistan but the reality is, they might not be in a position to have elections. Too many people willing to kill too many other people, a military that is both divided and willing and able to take control if they aren’t happy with the results, a nervous nuclear powered neighbor…anyone who says they know what’s going to happen is kidding themselves.
there’s no way that the Al Queada types were going to allow
Eh, depending on who you read, she supported those types. Actually ever figuring out who assassinated her is probably not going to happen.
Bill Mulligan said, āIt’s a mark of good acting skills and a good eye from the casting director that they looked at him and knew they had their Fonzy.ā
Although I believe Winkler has done more things behind the camera (producing, mostly) than in front of it since playing Fonzie, I think we can agree he avoided getting typecast in the role (and/or roles like it).
Another mark of good acting (at least to me) is when you see an actor in two different movies (made roughly the same time, so itās not a young version vs. old version situation), and you find yourself having to tell yourself, yes, itās the same guy. I believe I found myself in that situation when watching Armand Assante in a particular movie. He played a sympathetic character– a complete 180 from the vile person heād portrayed in the other film.
Similarly, but not quite the same, in an episode of Angel Amy Acker switched instantly from Illyriaās impersonation of Fred back to herself, and no traces of the āFredā persona lingered in her performance.
(though that was probably helped by the hours she spent in make-up to achieve that few seconds worth of film; but even so it must be challenging to keep something about one character (be it body language or whatever) from seeping into another.
But onto more important matters, I agree that nothing good will come from Bhuttoās assassination. Would anything good have come if sheād gone on to hold a position of power in the government? I donāt know. I know she was mired in controversy even before she went into exile.
But yes, the instability or potential instability in Pakistan is not good, especially if India āgets nervous.ā I know that other than having two somewhat antagonistic powers with nuclear capabilities keeping an eye on each other, the situation now is entirely different than in 1962, but in terms of a āstanding on the edgeā situation, might those two countries soon face their version of the Cuban Missile Crisis?
If so, letās hope saner heads prevail again.
The last report I read (from the New York Times online) was that no terrorist group had stepped forward to claim responsibility, suggesting the assassin may have acted alone. Has that information changed? Do we know if whomever killed her did so because he opposed her or because heād been a āsupporterā who felt she had āsold outā in some way?
You know like what happened with Anwar Sadat, and Indira Ganhdi and Yitzhak Rabin, and…
Rick
P.S. I was in 9th grade (sitting in study period in SeƱor Rodriquezās classroom) when I learned Sadat had been assassinated. SeƱor had obviously heard the news, because he brought a TV set into the classroom, and before tuning it to the news, said something about either the sad state of the world, or about the fact that certain types of people live among us.
Iām late to the party as usual. Ok then, from the topā¦
My favorite versions of the Christmas Carol story are Blackadderās Christmas Carol and Married With Childrenās take on it.
Iām absolutely against the colorization of black and white films. And itās not just because they do stupid things like making Old Blue Eyesā eyes brown, but rather itās that theyāre destroying an art form. Once the old school directors learned to use the format and the equipment was made to maximize the usage of black and white, the filmmakers of that era learned to use the stark contrasts in light and dark as a storytelling tool. The old black and white movie cameras could film, say, the shadows falling across a human face in such a way as to make them darker and deeper then they really were. Some of the classic horror and suspense directors used that to create mood.
Color film works on a different level of shading and contrast and you actually have to damage the image on old black and white prints to start the colorization process. They actually have to ābleachā the image to turn the harsher black tones into lighter greys and that tends to destroy the original level of contrast that was often times put into a scene by conscious design and planning. That can completely destroy the effectiveness of a scene.
My wife loves the old b&w detective movies. Thereās one she watches where one of the scenes near the end involves the detective taking a phone call from one of his contacts. The contact has information on the woman that the detective has fallen for but is convinced, along with the viewer, that she was involved with the plotlines primary murder. As heās on the phone, the camera cuts back and forth between him and her. You see her standing in the hallway with her face heavily masked by shadow. As the detectives contact gives him the information that exonerates her, she slowly steps forward and her face is slowly brought into full light without any remaining darkness. Itās was a nice little trick by the director to enhance the impact of the moment. Weāve seen theā¦ colorizedā¦ version. That sceneās visual impact is greatly lessened by the lighter contrast and the added color pallet.
Benazir Bhuttoā¦
This is going to get ugly. Canāt say that I didnāt see it coming though.
Well, being able to play different types of characters is a mark of range, rather than acting, per se. (But Amy Acker is a special case, in that her Ilryia voice is closer to her real voice than her Fred voice—it’s very good work both on a technical end and a creative level….)
I’m currently reading an annotated edition of “A Christmas Carol.” Conservatives like to claim that there’s a war on Christmas now? They don’t know from wars on Christmas. According to the book’s lengthy intro, back in the 17th Century England’s Roundhead government basically banned Christmas celebrations. Dickens’ book is largely credited for reigniting Christmas festivities after several centuries of very muted celebrating.
Ah, those goofy fundamentalist Christians and their anti-Christmas ways . . .
Personal favorite version? The musical SCROOGE which I made a point of seeing as a kid because Obi-Wan Kenobi was in it.
Anyone have any idea how I can track down the animated version of ACC that was referred to, the version based on the original illustrations? I’ve been looking for it for years…
There was a “so bad it’s almost good” version made in the 1990’s called “Ebenezer”, set in the Old Wild West and starring Jack Palance as the mean old miser, who went around muttering “hogwash” instead of “humbug”.
The animated version inspired by John Leech’s original drawings was made in 1971, directed by Richard williams & produced by Chuck Jones. The head animator was Ken Harris, who helped animate many of Jones’ Bugs Bunny & Road Runner cartoons.
It’s not available on DVD as far as I know, but it had been posted on YouTube. Look for “Christmas Carol” Williams.
I loved the Alistair Sim version. His joy on Christmas morn is a classic.
I never got the chance to see the Stewert 1 man show but I did hear from Marina Sirtis at a con how she nearly burst out laughing when in the middle of the show he did a ‘Picard’. The tugging of his jacket to straighten it.
DAvid