So good, saving for rewatch. One thing that would def. be helpful for viewers: floating a label over the movie clips as you show them. It gets confusing trying to visually decipher which is which.
It's bizzare hoe many of these adaptations are about not having the "Christmas spirit" with absolutely no examination of what the Christmas spirit even is beyond...sort of...liking Christmas? Having fun? So many of these movies posit that the only true meaning of Christmas is understanding that liking Christmas is the true meaning of Christmas. Having "Christmas spirit" truly is the "thoughts and prayers" of the season.
You're 100% correct about the Muppet version being the best version (although it's a shame the home versions always cut the "When Love is Gone" song out which you reall need for the ending to fully resonate)
I see by the comments that this was posted a few years ago. Well, today is December 23, 2024 and I've just finished watching your informative and thought provoking video. Thank you for the research, the examples (of what NOT to write, as well as what was decently written), and for the inspiration to attempt to write my own story using current events and individuals. I'm sharing this out and saving it for repeated watching. PEACE
I love A Christmas Carol so much that I end up watching several versions every Christmas. The only problem I have with the narrative is that Scrooge shows spurts of remorse but doesn't really change until he realizes he is going to die in the near future, which is oddly self centered because he is old and everybody is going to die eventually anyway. It would have been a better ending with his realization that he is loathed and alone and will die with his riches to be usurped by the state while he could have prevented the death of Tiny Tim and the suffering of others.
One interpretation I've heard is that the message isn't that he's going to die but that when he dies no one will care and in fact relish his death. Scrooge watches on in the future curious about who could be so wicked that they're a point of scorn and comedy even after death. That's just a personal thought though
And Carol for Another Christmas is a painfully underrated Christmas Carol adaptation that amazingly updates the story about the stupidity of Overt-Nationalism and Xenophobia, which in a way is the just as evil cousin of Captialism that we don't talk about enough.
I do actually worry in hindsight that I seemed too negative towards Carol for Another Christmas in the video. It's a really interesting piece, and I love that it's aware of the necessity of diplomacy and working collectively. Peter Sellers also knocks it out of the park. I'm adding a link to the film in the video description; everyone should check out this film if you have the chance!
I honestly think a modern Christmas Carol can only be done one way: instead of visiting Scrooge, spirits of revolution should visit Bob Cratchit or a working class surrogate and convince them to stop being a willing cog in the capitalist machine and fight for a better future for their and every working class family. Go full-on socialist/communist revolution. The tormented spirit would be a scab. Past would be a new-deal democrat or a well-known socialist/communist commentator or a labor leader from the past (to drum up interest for people to wiki and/or buy books by them) to talk about how organized unions are good and the good things they provided the working class folks. Present will be showing the current wealth inequality, showing the protagonist's company CEO doing what sociopathic or morally bankrupt CEOs do and show some working class families barely making ends meet. Income disparity. Future will show the protagonist the post-capitalist hellscape. Marginalized families being crushed by a capitalist society's bias: the police, the politicians protecting corporate interests and the establishment's milquetoast to puffpiece giving response to the rise of the far right ultra nationalism/fascism. Then the twist of it is when the death shroud is pulled off, it's still Present and they say "Surprise bitch, this shit's happening now. Eat the motherfucking rich!" Then the movie ends with guillotines. Gotta end one a super hyperbolic, grandiose note to have artistic license to deny that you're trying to insight an uprising but the rest of the film is good old fashion Communist Manifesto, blood pumping rabble rousing! A love letter to unions and coops and how amazing they can and will be!
Rise, like lions after slumber In unvanquishable number! Shake your chains to earth like dew Which in sleep had fallen on you: Ye are many-they are few!
I love A Christmas Carol, it's honestly one of the best ghost stories that I saw. Okay... that's a horrifying report, I'm really glad that people like Dickens were able to comment on it and that those comments eventually reached people to stop legal child labor. Oh... why are these adaptations the way that they are? Why not deconstruct each the main message and take a stab at each of the parts that Dickens used in his carol? Rod Serling. Ebbie. And that's it? Okay. What about Boozoo's ghosts? Nevermind... Maybe I can make A Christmas Carol multiverse cartoon parody where I put a clock on the rich's time to change their ways until all of the ghosts of the past people who've died or are dying as a result of the capitalistic system. I then show everyone on a Persona 4 Midnight Channel styled TV show across different universes what the capitalistic system does to individuals who are being oppressed by its unfair nature, and pick a victim to star in the show and die by their own misdeeds, their own Shadow, within the otherworld. Until they are able to confront their own actions and the truth of the system, then there is nothing that I or others can do for them. Everyone eventually teams up to take me down until they realize that I'm not in 100% control of this new world and that I was nothing more than a puppet for the system, then they confront that part of me, and then they have to beat each part of the systemic capitalism before the manifestation of capitalism reawakens this world to slaughter everyone who is unprepared to handle everyone in both worlds, which then ends in every other world except our real world being able to defeat the system, and so while all of the other "fictional universes" get to live "happily ever after", our world has to deal with the issues and have to watch as this world gets to live "happily ever after" while they themselves suffer until they stand up to the system.
great video! love your snarky commentary and great insights, also so cool to see more video essays not just on movies but on the wider (western) culture at larger. Fantastic editing and can't wait to see what you'll upload next!
I just found this channel, and I watched all the videos immediately. As someone who adores comprehensive, unapologetically leftist pop culture analysis, I look forward to watching your channel grow. :)
While definitely not the best version, my favorite version is Rankin/Bass' adaptation of the musical "The Stingiest Man in Town". The style and songs just appeal to me. The version I despise the most is Sony's "The Smurfs: A Christmas Carol", because it's just 22min of Grouchy getting psychologically abused for not celebrating christmas! And he even had a good reason for not wanting to celebrate christmas that year! He was fed up with never getting the one thing he always wished for, a hang glider (for some reason), but instead he always got a new hat (just like every other smurf did) and it got to the point where he was ridiculed for his wish by the other smurfs! He's not being stingy, he's not working anyone to the bone, he's just moping in his house. AND WE ARE SUPPOSED TO VIEW HIM AS A SCROOGE!? PAPA SMURF IS A FUCKING SOCIOPATH, GIVING GROUCHY A NIGHTMARE SPELL THAT PROPHECIES THE DOOM OF THE ENTIRE VILLAGE IF HE DOESN'T PLAY HIS PART IN THE CELEBRATION OF PUTTING THE STAR ON TOP OF OF THE TREE! THAT IS FUCKED UP!
Seconding the Smurfs movie there. I hate when a lot of modern movies boil down to 'they don't want to celebrate because of specific feelings, GET EM!!' Invalidating people's feelings isn't fun, and implying that they are the reason why their whole community suffers is fucked up. Like... Clearly the route to go would have been to target someone who is actually antagonizing and hurting others? What about making it Gargamel, who in the movie learns that 'hey... maybe I should see the smurfs as real fucking people'.
No Carrie Fisher no, you're better than this! Also George Orwell wrote a very very good essay about Charles Dicken's socialism and I would encourage everyone reading this comment to give it a read.
Even as a kid that phrase "surplus population" pissed me off. There's no such thing and anyone who would treat a person as "less than" has something wrong with them, something broken way down deep inside.
This editorial vid is well done and thoughtful. Its worth the half hour. As others have observed, the tone is a bit snarky. Id add a tad condescending. Analyses of the various film adaptations seemed legit but having watched Scrooged recently, Bill Murray got off lightly. As a Marxist critique, it was consistent, coherent, anachronistic and a thoroughly failed ideology . In response to the Cratchets Unite movement, I give popular British writers McCartney/Lennon the last word-You say you'll change the constitution Well, you know We'd all love to change your head You tell me it's the institution Well, you know You better free your mind instead But if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao You ain't going to make it with anyone anyhow.
Hmm while I do agree that Scrooged seems bent up on the wackiness of the of making TV. One thing that Scrooged succeeds with is that it does capture the phoniness of the TV industry and how it relies on cheap ploys to get viewers interest all while not even being able to do the bare minimum for those who need it. Like for example look at all the effort that Frank puts in the Christmas special with that he doesn't even think for a moment about how stupid it is to force folks to work on Christmas Eve. That and just how he clearly doesn't care about how employees such as Grace have to sacrifice and what it comes at the cost of. It might not be a perfect indicment of captialism but it comes close.
The interesting thing about the original story is that working on Christmas was very common when "A Christmas Carol" was written. The US notion of a "traditional Christmas" was created by Victorian authors like Charles Dickens. In fact, Christmas was often not celebrated because merry-making and partying was seen as Unchristian-like behavior. Christmas wasn't a national holiday until 1870.
So good, saving for rewatch. One thing that would def. be helpful for viewers: floating a label over the movie clips as you show them. It gets confusing trying to visually decipher which is which.
It's bizzare hoe many of these adaptations are about not having the "Christmas spirit" with absolutely no examination of what the Christmas spirit even is beyond...sort of...liking Christmas? Having fun?
So many of these movies posit that the only true meaning of Christmas is understanding that liking Christmas is the true meaning of Christmas.
Having "Christmas spirit" truly is the "thoughts and prayers" of the season.
Well, that's a good pooint
I hate how underrated this channel is.
You're 100% correct about the Muppet version being the best version (although it's a shame the home versions always cut the "When Love is Gone" song out which you reall need for the ending to fully resonate)
“Comrade Carsen Kressly” IM ROLLING
I see by the comments that this was posted a few years ago. Well, today is December 23, 2024 and I've just finished watching your informative and thought provoking video. Thank you for the research, the examples (of what NOT to write, as well as what was decently written), and for the inspiration to attempt to write my own story using current events and individuals. I'm sharing this out and saving it for repeated watching. PEACE
I love A Christmas Carol so much that I end up watching several versions every Christmas. The only problem I have with the narrative is that Scrooge shows spurts of remorse but doesn't really change until he realizes he is going to die in the near future, which is oddly self centered because he is old and everybody is going to die eventually anyway. It would have been a better ending with his realization that he is loathed and alone and will die with his riches to be usurped by the state while he could have prevented the death of Tiny Tim and the suffering of others.
One interpretation I've heard is that the message isn't that he's going to die but that when he dies no one will care and in fact relish his death. Scrooge watches on in the future curious about who could be so wicked that they're a point of scorn and comedy even after death. That's just a personal thought though
That makes sense, @@dreamythesheep. It seems to me to be the most sensible interpretation.
And Carol for Another Christmas is a painfully underrated Christmas Carol adaptation that amazingly updates the story about the stupidity of Overt-Nationalism and Xenophobia, which in a way is the just as evil cousin of Captialism that we don't talk about enough.
I do actually worry in hindsight that I seemed too negative towards Carol for Another Christmas in the video. It's a really interesting piece, and I love that it's aware of the necessity of diplomacy and working collectively. Peter Sellers also knocks it out of the park.
I'm adding a link to the film in the video description; everyone should check out this film if you have the chance!
I honestly think a modern Christmas Carol can only be done one way: instead of visiting Scrooge, spirits of revolution should visit Bob Cratchit or a working class surrogate and convince them to stop being a willing cog in the capitalist machine and fight for a better future for their and every working class family. Go full-on socialist/communist revolution.
The tormented spirit would be a scab.
Past would be a new-deal democrat or a well-known socialist/communist commentator or a labor leader from the past (to drum up interest for people to wiki and/or buy books by them) to talk about how organized unions are good and the good things they provided the working class folks.
Present will be showing the current wealth inequality, showing the protagonist's company CEO doing what sociopathic or morally bankrupt CEOs do and show some working class families barely making ends meet. Income disparity.
Future will show the protagonist the post-capitalist hellscape. Marginalized families being crushed by a capitalist society's bias: the police, the politicians protecting corporate interests and the establishment's milquetoast to puffpiece giving response to the rise of the far right ultra nationalism/fascism. Then the twist of it is when the death shroud is pulled off, it's still Present and they say "Surprise bitch, this shit's happening now. Eat the motherfucking rich!" Then the movie ends with guillotines.
Gotta end one a super hyperbolic, grandiose note to have artistic license to deny that you're trying to insight an uprising but the rest of the film is good old fashion Communist Manifesto, blood pumping rabble rousing! A love letter to unions and coops and how amazing they can and will be!
This season, a spirit haunts Europe, the spirit of Christmarx!
Rise, like lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number!
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you:
Ye are many-they are few!
Comrade, your channel deserves so much more attention. This is great.
"but what about the person who *didn't* get Turkey because Tiny Tim did, hm?" is such a Megan McArdle argument
Honestly now I kind of want to check and see if she's ever written anything about A Christmas Carol...because she absolutely would write that.
I love A Christmas Carol, it's honestly one of the best ghost stories that I saw.
Okay... that's a horrifying report, I'm really glad that people like Dickens were able to comment on it and that those comments eventually reached people to stop legal child labor.
Oh... why are these adaptations the way that they are? Why not deconstruct each the main message and take a stab at each of the parts that Dickens used in his carol?
Rod Serling. Ebbie. And that's it? Okay.
What about Boozoo's ghosts? Nevermind...
Maybe I can make A Christmas Carol multiverse cartoon parody where I put a clock on the rich's time to change their ways until all of the ghosts of the past people who've died or are dying as a result of the capitalistic system. I then show everyone on a Persona 4 Midnight Channel styled TV show across different universes what the capitalistic system does to individuals who are being oppressed by its unfair nature, and pick a victim to star in the show and die by their own misdeeds, their own Shadow, within the otherworld. Until they are able to confront their own actions and the truth of the system, then there is nothing that I or others can do for them. Everyone eventually teams up to take me down until they realize that I'm not in 100% control of this new world and that I was nothing more than a puppet for the system, then they confront that part of me, and then they have to beat each part of the systemic capitalism before the manifestation of capitalism reawakens this world to slaughter everyone who is unprepared to handle everyone in both worlds, which then ends in every other world except our real world being able to defeat the system, and so while all of the other "fictional universes" get to live "happily ever after", our world has to deal with the issues and have to watch as this world gets to live "happily ever after" while they themselves suffer until they stand up to the system.
great video! love your snarky commentary and great insights, also so cool to see more video essays not just on movies but on the wider (western) culture at larger. Fantastic editing and can't wait to see what you'll upload next!
Your videos deserve way more views. Fantastic job.
Fantastic work, magnificent ending; love what you're doing - and it's so well needed, too.
Muppet Christmas Carol remains the best one.
I just found this channel, and I watched all the videos immediately. As someone who adores comprehensive, unapologetically leftist pop culture analysis, I look forward to watching your channel grow. :)
It's upsetting how RUclips's algorithm ostracizes brilliant channels like this.
Agree. I can't believe these vids have such low view counts.
While definitely not the best version, my favorite version is Rankin/Bass' adaptation of the musical "The Stingiest Man in Town". The style and songs just appeal to me.
The version I despise the most is Sony's "The Smurfs: A Christmas Carol", because it's just 22min of Grouchy getting psychologically abused for not celebrating christmas!
And he even had a good reason for not wanting to celebrate christmas that year! He was fed up with never getting the one thing he always wished for, a hang glider (for some reason), but instead he always got a new hat (just like every other smurf did) and it got to the point where he was ridiculed for his wish by the other smurfs!
He's not being stingy, he's not working anyone to the bone, he's just moping in his house.
AND WE ARE SUPPOSED TO VIEW HIM AS A SCROOGE!?
PAPA SMURF IS A FUCKING SOCIOPATH, GIVING GROUCHY A NIGHTMARE SPELL THAT PROPHECIES THE DOOM OF THE ENTIRE VILLAGE IF HE DOESN'T PLAY HIS PART IN THE CELEBRATION OF PUTTING THE STAR ON TOP OF OF THE TREE!
THAT IS FUCKED UP!
Seconding the Smurfs movie there. I hate when a lot of modern movies boil down to 'they don't want to celebrate because of specific feelings, GET EM!!' Invalidating people's feelings isn't fun, and implying that they are the reason why their whole community suffers is fucked up. Like... Clearly the route to go would have been to target someone who is actually antagonizing and hurting others? What about making it Gargamel, who in the movie learns that 'hey... maybe I should see the smurfs as real fucking people'.
An important reminder: There are people alive today who want to bring back child labor and debtors' prisons.
oh dang youre on a roll
No Carrie Fisher no, you're better than this! Also George Orwell wrote a very very good essay about Charles Dicken's socialism and I would encourage everyone reading this comment to give it a read.
what a fantastic video
Even as a kid that phrase "surplus population" pissed me off. There's no such thing and anyone who would treat a person as "less than" has something wrong with them, something broken way down deep inside.
I love this. You might enjoy my Radical Pagan Christmas video about seizing Christmas traditions as tools of popular revolt.
Great video!
The 2009 Robert Zemeckis Motion Capture adaptation is the best one.
It's at least the most accurate to the novella.
Murry crisis! And thanks for the ☕☕
I can't believe Barry Bluejeans kissed a modern female Scrooge!
This editorial vid is well done and thoughtful. Its worth the half hour. As others have observed, the tone is a bit snarky. Id add a tad condescending. Analyses of the various film adaptations seemed legit but having watched Scrooged recently, Bill Murray got off lightly. As a Marxist critique, it was consistent, coherent, anachronistic and a thoroughly failed ideology . In response to the Cratchets Unite movement, I give popular British writers McCartney/Lennon the last word-You say you'll change the constitution
Well, you know
We'd all love to change your head
You tell me it's the institution
Well, you know
You better free your mind instead
But if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao
You ain't going to make it with anyone anyhow.
Hmm while I do agree that Scrooged seems bent up on the wackiness of the of making TV. One thing that Scrooged succeeds with is that it does capture the phoniness of the TV industry and how it relies on cheap ploys to get viewers interest all while not even being able to do the bare minimum for those who need it.
Like for example look at all the effort that Frank puts in the Christmas special with that he doesn't even think for a moment about how stupid it is to force folks to work on Christmas Eve.
That and just how he clearly doesn't care about how employees such as Grace have to sacrifice and what it comes at the cost of. It might not be a perfect indicment of captialism but it comes close.
The interesting thing about the original story is that working on Christmas was very common when "A Christmas Carol" was written. The US notion of a "traditional Christmas" was created by Victorian authors like Charles Dickens. In fact, Christmas was often not celebrated because merry-making and partying was seen as Unchristian-like behavior. Christmas wasn't a national holiday until 1870.