A Christmas Carol has survived Barbie, Mickey Mouse, Mr. Magoo and even Matthew McConaughey (if you count Ghosts of Girlfriends Past).
So if you're Jim Carrey and Robert Zemeckis, tackling yet another variation of Charles Dickens' Yuletide classic is like being Kenny Rogers' plastic surgeon or Amy Winehouse's new dealer: really, how could you do more damage than what's already been done?
Conversely, though, how do you reinvigorate a story that's seemingly been strip-mined to the point of parody?
Considering Zemeckis' last two films were the computer-generated spectacles Beowulf and The Polar Express, it's no surprise he found his answer, not on the page, but in a hard-drive.
This Christmas Carol, rendered in immersive 3D animation, is Dickens as video-game designer, a morality play gussied up as a theme park ride.
Untethered by physics, Zemeckis' camera doesn't merely pan, it swoops and soars.
And if Carrey, who stars in multiple roles including that of mythical miser Ebenezer Scrooge, wasn't elastic enough already, here he's digitally outfitted with a pointed chin and hooked nose.
2.5 out of 5
