This year we're going to start with our favorite version of Charles Dicken's classic tale - Scrooged. It's as close as we can get to the Goldman Sachs & Wall Street version that should be made - although we were thinking Senator Coburn (the sole member of the Let's kill healthcare for 9/11 first responders caucus) would make a great Scrooge as well.
Bill Murray was born for this role - it was in our humble opinion his best performance ever. Although Mr. Murry has gotten acclaim in a variety of roles over the past decade - none of those carried with them the enthusiasm and panache that characterized his classics like Scrooged and Groundhog Day.
Where were you in 1988? Some of us remember it well being the old timers that we are (not all of our reviewers are that aged of course). Seeing this film in the theater was a treat - we really didn't know what to expect and were very pleasantly surprised. Some of us have been watching this nearly every Christmas since. Why? well - we'd already seen the 1840's version of a Christmas Carol about 25 times (in 5 different versions) and this film had an astonishing ensemble cast, a hilarious yet touching script and a dynamic lead in Bill Murray - it's the tale adapted to our age. And twenty some years later things haven't changed that much - the satire on modern society is still sharp and more relevant than old Ebeneezer at the London exchange ever could be. The Me decade has of course morphed into the Me-first Century and we are trying our best to recreate the poverty and despair of Dicken's time - will enough good hearted people defeat the evil forces of Wall Street ? who knows...
The official trailer for Scrooged, circa 1988 - which now officially belongs in the realm of the ghost of Christmas Past
The story is the same - at its basic level - lost opportunities, lost love, lost values, and a life almost wasted - yet ready to be reprieved after a Christmas Eve Transformation. How did it turn out? Well, in this film the Scrooge character (Murray) is given his second chance before he got too old and he took it. We like to think that everyone will be given that type of chance when or if they need it and that everyone will have a chance to watch this movie as part of their holidays celebration and tradition.
Remember, the ghosts are only scary if you're not willing to listen to what they have to say - Merry Christmas !
Well, this wasn't part of the movie - but we wanted to remember the Late Jim Varney in the Christmas Carol inspired ad...
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