Scrooge (1935) - Part 1

Scrooge (1935)
Director: Henry Edwards
Scrooge: Seymour Hicks

Now we'll take a look at another full-length movie adaptation: "Scrooge," a 1935 British production starring Sir Seymour Hicks.

This is a version I had heard about way back in the pre-internet days when hearing about such things was much harder! I knew this was older than the 1938 MGM version and that Sir Seymour Hicks was renowned for his portrayal of Scrooge, but had never seen it on TV.

Then in the mid-1980s, home video came along and all sorts of public domain movies such as this became available. In horrible umpteenth generation copies, but you could see stuff you had never seen before.

When I finally got my mitts on this thing, I felt like I was holding the Rosetta Stone - the first full-length talking version of "A Christmas Carol."

Side note: It's interesting that this movie and its fellow British theatrical versions from 1951 and 1970 were all titled "Scrooge" rather than "A Christmas Carol." Coincidence? Who knows?

Anyway, there are a couple of different cuts of this film, one running about an hour and the other about 17 minutes longer than that. I don't know why there are two versions, but they have different credits. The short cut has just static title cards with very brief credits, whereas the long cut has a hand opening a book of "A Christmas Carol," then turning the pages to reveal longer credits, winding up at the preface. Interestingly, the short version bills Philip Frost (as Tiny Tim) much higher.

The first copy of this film that I had on VHS was a washed out short version. Once DVDs came out, I got a better transfer of the longer version. Nowadays because it's in the public domain, all sorts of videos of varying quality pop up all over the place. There's even a colorized version!

I don't know if the original elements still exist, so we have to take what we can get, but I'd love to see a copy that's as clean as that 1938 MGM version. Only three years passed in between them, but it seems like light years.

In any event, I really like this version. It has tons of atmosphere and a few touches not commonly seen. And Sir Seymour Hicks is certainly a great Scrooge. I can see it being a tough watch for the average modern viewer, however, as the image and sound are a little rough and it's definitely dated without much in the way of special effects and heavy use of background music.

But, if you already like movies from the '30s and Scrooge, this is a good one!