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Wednesday, November 23, 2022

MICKEY'S CHRISTMAS CAROL (1984)

In possibly the saddest of Disney’s occasional attempts to reestablish Mickey Mouse as a working animated character and not just a safe corporate logo or the domesticated suburban Dad he was in the ‘50s (his Fred MacMurray period), the company ‘imagineers’ done him wrong by casting the former ‘30s anarchist as ‘mousey’ Bob Crachit in this ‘tab show’ version of the Dickens’ classic running about half an hour.  With ‘Scrooge’ McDuck as Ebenezer Scrooge (shouldn’t he be playing Jacob Marley with Mickey taking a shot at the lead, so the transformation would actually be touching?), and a host of cross-plugs for Disney regulars to fill out the rest of the cast.  (Admittedly, Mole and Water Rat from WIND AND THE WILLOWS as the two men asking for donations an inspired touch.  But you can’t even begin to make a decent CHRISTMAS CAROL if you skip those personificating youngsters ‘Ignorance’ and ‘Want.’)  And technically, note how the animators open the film with a wan repeat of the stupendous multi-plane shot from PINOCCHIO/’40 moving from on high down into the town, here done sans multi-plane technical daring.  No doubt too expensive for a short originally shown on tv as part of a holiday package.  Needless to say, Mickey returned to glad-handing duties like some old boxer in Las Vegas used as a greeter to bring customers into various Disney park properties around the world.

WATCH THIS, NOT THAT/LINK:  See our Christmas Carol Write-Ups via this LINK, including the one most like this, the remarkable MR. MAGOO version from 1962.   https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/search?q=dickens+christmas+carol

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY:  Dickens’ original story, when properly caught in a dramatization, should be as scary as one of the classic early Disney animated features.

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