Noël chez les Muppets

I love this movie. I am a big muppet fan, and when this movie came out on video I had to get it. Of course I was in third grade. I watched this movie all the time, and still do around Christmas time. Every December I watch this movie twenty times. Everything about this movie is great. The plot to the music. I especially like the music. I recommend this movie to anyone who likes the Muppets, or the story of The Christmas Carol.

Brian Henson does his dad proud in this, the first Muppet feature filmed after Jim Henson's death. All the things which have made the Muppets appealing--charm, humor, tenderness--are very much in evidence in this adaption of Charles Dickens' much-retold classic.

Michael Caine fills the central role of Ebeneezer Scrooge admirably, throwing himself into the part with much energy and gusto. Familiar Muppet faces take up several roles--Kermit and Miss Piggy as Bob and Mrs. Cratchit, Robin as Tiny Tim, elderly hecklers Statler and Waldorf as the Marley brothers (Dickens' character Jacob and original creation Robert)--with new Muppets designed for the roles of the three Christmas ghosts. The result is a somewhat fanciful 19th-century London where humans, animals, talking vegetables, and various undefinable creatures live side-by-side. In spite of potential complications the concept works very well, thanks to the spirited performances by both actors and Muppet handlers.

Gonzo (adopting the persona of Dickens himself) and Rizzo the Rat narrate the story and add a healthy dose of humor to the proceedings. But the film knows when to be serious--the climactic scene focusing on Christmas Yet to Come is as eerie and touching as it should be. And ultimately, the resolution leaves one with the warm, peaceful joy synonomous with the season. Definitely a movie which deserves a place among the family classics of the holidays.

While the 1951 Alistair Sim version of A Christmas Carol is the most faithful to the original Dickens story, A Muppet Christmas Carol possesses heart, whimsey, and a joy that is so very much lacking in our evermore commercialized holiday season. Michael Caine's performance as Scrooge easily surpasses those of Reginald Owen (1938), George C. Scott (1984) and Patrick Stewart (2001). There is a more genuine degree of transformation and redemption in his characterization than has often been portrayed. This makes the story a truly wonderful experience both for adults as well as for children.

The use of the Muppets in the various roles makes for a lively film experience. Statler and Waldorf as Jacob & Robert Marley are appropriately heckling as they seek to convince Scrooge to change his ways. Kermit the Frog is a wonderfully sympathetic Bob Crachit just as Miss Piggy is appropriately and aggressively belligerent Mrs. Crachit. Perhaps one of the better-inspired comedy bits comes with the arrival of Scrooge and the Ghost of Christmas Past at Scrooge's former workplace, described as "Fozziwig's Rubber Chicken Factory." Such bits are frequent and help to keep the story fun. Paul Williams' music score and songs are eminently singable and leave the viewer with a lasting memory.

A Muppet Christmas Carol has joined the pantheon of classic holiday films, easily ranking alongside Holiday Inn, White Christmas and A Christmas Story. It is the opinion of this reviewer that for those whom holiday films have become a part of holiday celebration should make this a part of their seasonal experience. One might even complete the film humming the tunes and thinking better of themselves as well as of their fellow humans. In other words, Henson and company have made Dickens story as memorable as Dickens himself wished it to be.

The Muppet Christmas Carol is my favourite of all the Muppet flicks. Jim Henson, of course, never lent his name to anything even remotely resembling 'bad', but nevertheless, there is a clear mark of sheer mastery and brilliance in this movie that is somehow less evident in most of the other muppet movies.

In a way, I have to admit that I find this surprising. This was the first Muppet movie to be shot after Henson himself passed away; the voice of kermit, the most beloved and indeed inventive puppeteer ever to have lived was dead. Could Henson's magic touch ever be recreated? Did the Muppets have a future at all without their creator? The answer, of course we now know, is Yes they did.

As is the secret to all truly great children's movies, The Muppet Christmas Carol does not pander to notions of anything being 'too scary'; nor does it shy away from the innate darkness of the material at hand.

Dicken's tale is one that revolves almost uniformly around themes of corruption, poverty and death, and here it has most certainly not been diluted.

"There was the year we evicted the entire orphanage! I remember the little tykes all standing in the snowbank, with their little frostbitten teddy bears!" hollers a ghostly apparition of Scrooge's dead business partner early in the film. We witness a heartbreaking lament from Scrooge's lover, who leaves him because he has become too money-hungry to love her. We watch as Bob Cratchett's family mourn the empty chair at their table where their beloved and selfless young son once sat. At the eleventh hour, scrooge even bends before his own tombstone and begs in tears of desperation to a grim reaper-like spirit to be allowed to live. So much for it being the season to be jolly.

Where there is humour, it is frequently black, and where there is emotion, it is generally somewhat adult by todays standards.

Of course, before you decide not to show this to your five year old son or daughter, you should consider that these dark themes by no means drag the film down; rather, they help to raise it up to become, just like the original story, a stirring and emotional story of triumph and redemption in the face of mortality.

Whilst the script writers wisely keep the story pretty much identical to the original in all of it's major aspects, there is plenty mayhem and indeed magic here too which is 24 carat Henson Studios. I remember as a 5 year old simply adoring the spectacle of Kermit's Bob Cratchett taking part in a the Penguins of London Annual Christmas Skating party, or the delight of Gonzo and Rizzo's almost post-modernist presence as physical participants but also omnipotent narrators in the tale.

Indeed, the translation from book to screen is almost peculiarly elegant; the Muppet characters all seem to open up to new ranges of poignancy and dramatic possibility when placed in the storyline. You will find yourself feeling immense pity for Miss Piggy's somewhat hysterical but ultimately warm Mrs Cratchett for example, and indeed a whole host of wonderful performances on show from the familiar Muppet Show Cast.

Of course this review could not be complete without tribute to the simply brilliant performance from the great Michael Cane in the role of Ebeneezer Scrooge. he understands his role excellently and invests it with a moving, convincing and genius reality; always resisting the temptation, that must surely be strongly felt when one is the sole human among a cast of felt puppets, to play the role for laughs. One feels that his performance would not seem out of place if he were surrounded by the ranks of great British thespians and taking part in a 'straight' production of Dicken's tale as opposed to a Muppet movie. Upon recently viewing the Patrick Stewart film of this story, I was delighted to find that Cane quite simply out-acted Stewart in the role and clearly this makes his performance something special.

The production values are high in this film as is to be expected in a Henson movie, and the film has a wonderful, almost Tim Burton-esquire look which is by turns wintry and quite breath-takingly beautiful or dark and positively scary.

In terms of music it is filled with an array of wonderfully enduring and subtly written songs that fill me with a sense of child-like happiness and that allusive 'christmassey feeling' even after all these years. One recommendation I would make to anyone planning on purchasing the film is to if at all possible obtain a copy which contains the beautiful song "When Love Is Gone" which, in the recent DVD re-release, was sadly cut from the film. This decision to exclude the song from the film detracts hugely from the pathos of one of the film's central themes (past Mistakes and ultimate redemption) and definitely takes away some of the indescribably bitter-sweet overall mood of the film.

I strongly recommend this film to people of any age or gender as a film that it is virtually impossible not to fall in love with.

A The Muppet Christmas Carol is the Muppet's take on the classic tale of Ebenezer Scrooge, a selfish old man who cares nothing for anyone but himself, until on Christmas Eve he is visited by three spirits, telling him to change his ways. This is a well done version of the story, and it is the only Muppet movie I can look at as a real movie, rather than a movie starring Muppets.

The way the story is told in this movie is done really well. Having Gonzo play Charles Dickens as he narrates the story was a smart move. It adds more humour to the story. The different characters that Muppets pop up as are genius, for instance, changing Fuzzywig to Fozziewig so Fozzie Bear could play him. Also, the movie manages to remain dark like the story should be, while also staying tame for kids.

Micahel Caine is great as Ebenezer Scrooge. He's actually one of the best Scrooge's I've seen. It really speaks for his acting talent when he is able to talk and react to Muppets like they're people.

Overall, this is a classic children's film, and is probably one of the best versions of the classic tale on screen.

8/10