Feature: EBENEZER

Guest contributor David Appleford offers his take on Paramount’s holiday release of EBENEZER, produced by Emma Watts and featuring Johnny Depp and Ian McKellen – now in cinemas throughout the country.

Charles Dickens could never have imagined that his Christmas ghost story would become something of a cinematic industry. Ebenezer Scrooge is resurrected so often on screen that even the old miser himself might complain about the excessive expenditure. Yet there’s something irresistible about filmmakers returning to A Christmas Carol, each convinced there’s another way of telling a story whose ending has never been in doubt. Perhaps it’s because the tale’s appeal has little to do with whether we believe in ghosts. It succeeds because of what we believe about human nature. The spirits may provide the spectacle, but the real magic comes from convincing us, once again, that a thoroughly unpleasant man might actually deserve a second chance.

Director Ti West, better known for cult horror favorites such as The Innkeepers and Pearl, has done something most interpretations of Dickens’ Christmas redemption story rarely attempt. Working from a screenplay by Nathaniel Halpern, EBENEZER may not follow the original slavishly, but West uses his horror background to create an immersive, genuinely eerie Victorian London. This is a city of industrial grime and decaying buildings, its crowded streets filled with vendors, horse-drawn carts, ankle-deep mud, and beggars extending their tin cups. Occasionally, a black raven flies overhead, observing events like something out of Edgar Allan Poe.

The desperation of London’s working class becomes a powerful appeal for empathy, precisely as Dickens intended. It’s a far cry from the family-friendly holiday pageants that sanitize the author’s social commentary in favor of picturesque, snow-covered streets. There’s nothing wrong with that approach. Many audiences have their favorite version of the tale, often resembling an idyllic Christmas postcard. But that’s hardly Dickens’ London. West gives us a city shrouded in coal-smoke fog and damp, biting cold, an atmosphere beautifully realized through Eve Stewart’s production design and Checco Varese’s widescreen cinematography.

More importantly, West refuses to sanitize the horror. Too many adaptations soften the supernatural elements to preserve a family-friendly atmosphere, overlooking something essential: Scrooge’s bone-chilling terror is the catalyst for his transformation. Without genuine fear, his redemption risks becoming little more than a narrative obligation. We know the ghosts are coming, and we know Scrooge will eventually discover the error of his ways. But here, knowing what comes next doesn't necessarily make the experience any less frightening.

Each spirit serves as both a psychological mirror and a cinematic spectacle. Ian McKellen’s Jacob Marley, burdened with clanking chains and rusted cashboxes that will drag behind him for eternity, projects an almost unbearable sense of torment. It’s a formidable performance, and McKellen may well rank among the finest cinematic portrayals of Scrooge’s long-dead business partner.

Andrea Riseborough’s Ghost of Christmas Past bears little resemblance to Dickens’ description, but her ethereal appearance and quietly commanding presence are effective. She forces Scrooge to confront the painful memories of his childhood, refusing to let him look away.

Tramell Tillman’s Ghost of Christmas Present is hardly the traditional, jovial Father Christmas with a booming laugh and welcoming warmth. Nevertheless, he’s a commanding, larger-than-life presence whose gradual aging brings an increasingly chilling severity. His condemnation of Scrooge’s indifference to human suffering culminates in a particularly disturbing confrontation with Ignorance and Want.

The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come remains the most traditional of the three spirits, a gloomy, shrouded specter whose slow, deliberate gestures are more unsettling than any spoken threat. It’s a figure that needs no dialogue. A single pointed finger is enough to force Scrooge toward the ghastly future awaiting him.

Rupert Grint’s Bob Cratchit provides the film’s emotional heart. Best known for the Harry Potter series, Grint brings an authentic, unforced goodness to the role without reducing the character to a pitiable victim. Despite his poverty, this Cratchit finds genuine pleasure in the festive season and in the company of a family he clearly adores. His warmth offers a necessary contrast to the coldness of Scrooge’s existence.

Casting director Olivia Grant has assembled an excellent supporting ensemble, but it’s Johnny Depp in the title role who leaves the strongest impression. His Scrooge is no over-the-top villain, nor is he inherently evil. Depp allows us to recognize the damaged man beneath the miserly exterior without excusing his cruelty. It's a carefully measured performance that keeps us engaged even when the character is at his most disagreeable.

Anyone playing Scrooge must navigate anger, bitterness, panic, grief, and finally an almost childlike explosion of giddiness and joy. Depp handles every transition remarkably well, making the transformation feel earned rather than inevitable. Every generation has its favorite Scrooge. Depp has made a persuasive claim to being this generation’s Ebenezer.

Naturally, there are departures from the original. We glimpse Scrooge’s abusive father, a figure only briefly referenced in Dickens’ novella, and witness the cruelty that helped shape young Ebenezer. More surprisingly, we see a possible future in which Bob Cratchit ends up in debtor’s prison, an unsettling extension of Scrooge’s indifference. Although absent from the book, the sequence has a particularly Dickensian resonance. The author knew that world firsthand after his own father was imprisoned for debt when Charles was a boy. It’s an invention that works.

Less successful is the treatment of the two charitable gentlemen. Initially, their genial manner when requesting a donation for the poor is exactly as it should be. But in a revised glimpse of the future, they become willing conspirators in a fraudulent will, gleefully participating in a criminal act that contradicts everything their characters represent. Dickens purists will undoubtedly object, and with good reason. It’s a narrative miscalculation. So is witnessing the murder of ol’ man Fezziwig. It’s a moment of violence that has no place in the story, not even in a dark telling of the tale such as this.

Still, despite those questionable departures, West’s genuinely frightening, PG-13 interpretation proves just how remarkably resistant to exhaustion A Christmas Carol remains. In a world that rarely offers second chances, there’s something undeniably satisfying about spending a couple of hours with a man who gets one. And even more satisfying is watching him embrace it with Johnny Depp’s unrestrained gusto.

EBENEZER is now screening at cinemas nationwide.

Photo credit to Jaap Buitendijk, Paramount Pictures