Christmas Carol, A

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

A marvelous and touching yuletide toy of a movie.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

An exhilarating visual experience and proves for the third time he's (Zemeck) is one of the few directors who knows what he's doing with 3-D.

New Orleans Times-Picayune Mike Scott

As beautiful as the animation is, Zemeckis' real masterstroke is combining it with a loyalty to Dickens' story.

Time Out New York Keith Uhlich

The unspoken theme underlying Dickens’s prose--that the money-grubbing Ebenezer is conversing with semblances of his own self--finds near-perfect cinematic expression through Carrey’s efforts.

Time Richard Corliss

A ghost story, a bustling action-adventure and an example of the comedy tour-de-farce, in which the star validates his virtuosity by appearing in a plethora of funny disguises.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

There's something to be said for the power of a classic, even if it has been given an imperfect makeover.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

This time, though, Zemeckis has another technical trick up his sleeve – 3-D – and for once the gimmick succeeds.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

Shockingly, the new film turns out to be very good, at times close to brilliant: a darkly detailed marvel of creative visualization that does well by Dickens and right by audiences - when it’s not trying to sell them a theme park ride.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

Could there possibly be anything left to gain from yet another adaptation of Charles Dickens' tale about crabby old Ebenezer Scrooge and his life-changing encounter with three ghosts on Christmas Eve? In the case of Disney's A Christmas Carol, the answer is a surprising, resounding yes -- at least so far as the IMAX 3D version goes.

San Francisco Chronicle Amy Biancolli

If some of the animation overdoes it, a lot of it is downright gorgeous. Few images this year have followed me home like the Ghost of Christmas Past, here imagined as a bright-flamed candle with the face of a child. It flickers. It whispers. It flies.

The New York Times A.O. Scott

A Christmas Carol -- I mean the source material, without a corporate possessive attached to it -- remains among the most moving works of holiday literature, and Mr. Zemeckis has remained true to its finest sentiments. He is an innovator, but his traditionalism is what makes this movie work.

Slate Dana Stevens

Nearly every line of dialogue in this adaptation of A Christmas Carol comes directly from the story. What interpolations there are have to do with juicing up the transitions between scenes with unnecessary, but not obnoxiously intrusive, action.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

Carrey’s Scrooge is deliciously pinched and credible. As, indeed, is this film -- that is, when it feels like Dickens and not a theme park ride.

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

Jim Carrey is good as Scrooge. There’s surprisingly little shtick in his performance.

New York Daily News Joe Neumaier

Like a dime-store holiday card, this Christmas Carol is well-crafted but artless, detailed but lacking soul.

Empire Angie Errigo

It’s always a good story, this time told more creepily than usual. Good, but not as good as The Muppets’ Christmas Carol, Scrooged, Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol or some great, classic live action classic versions.

New York Post Kyle Smith

Unless the director was aiming for a Victorian "Black Christmas," though, he overshot his mark

Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan

A fable that is by turns antic, scary, sweet and, in the end, slightly soulless. In other words, it's a heartwarmer that doesn't have much of a heart itself.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

Visually immersive but emotionally uninvolving.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

The holiday spirit feels real, but the film does not.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

Zemeckis captures all the story’s terror, but its pathos has always been the real challenge, and it mostly eludes him.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch Joe Williams

It's eerie rather than wondrous.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Zemeckis' A Christmas Carol is, in its essence, a product reel, a showy, exuberant demonstration of the glories of motion capture, computer animation and 3D technology. On that level, it's a wow. On any emotional level, it's as cold as Marley's Ghost.

Variety Todd McCarthy

Shortchanging traditional animation by literalizing it while robbing actors of their full range of facial expressiveness, the performance-capture technique favored by director Robert Zemeckis looks more than ever like the emperor's new clothes in Disney's A Christmas Carol.

Village Voice Ella Taylor

A Christmas Carol is a whiz-bang 3-D thrill-ride with all the emotional satisfaction squeezed out of it.

NPR Scott Tobias

Gary Oldman pulls off his own hat trick, playing both noble Bob Cratchit and sickly Tiny Tim, as well as Scrooge's late partner, Marley, who haunts the miser in fluorescent green.

USA Today Claudia Puig

This Christmas Carol seems like a pale ghost of Dickens' magical Christmas classic.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

Zemeckis tries to juice things up by staging numerous chase scenes up and around London, but do we really need "A Christmas Carol: The Action Picture"?

Salon.com Mary Elizabeth Williams

The 3-D film is flat, the CGI-enhanced characters oddly waxen. In the center of the action is Jim Carrey -- or at least a dead-eyed, doll-like version of Carrey -- playing Scrooge, the ghosts, a younger version of himself, and probably a dozen other parts. As a general rule of thumb, one Jim Carrey is plenty for any movie.

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

Either you cotton to Zemeckis’ motion-capture aesthetic or you don’t: To me, it seems like an awful lot of effort for an insignificant payoff. But it appears that the filmmaker is stuck on the technique – at least until holographic movie technology comes along.

Los Angeles Times Betsy Sharkey

What are in very short supply, though, are the central chords of Dickens' carol: Crachit's generous spirit, Tiny Tim's sad plight, Scrooge's emotional arc as he finds his humanity. Oh, the scenes are there amid the action, but they are fleeting. By the time A Christmas Carol finishes piling its many shiny presents with their many bells and whistles under the tree, there's no room left for tears for Tiny Tim. Bah humbug indeed.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

This sad excuse for family entertainment tries to enshrine a classic while defacing it.