ADVENT CALENDAR – DAY 15

My mention of Charles Dickens in yesterday’s post about malevolent puppets reminds me that ‘tis the season for Dickens adaptations.

So it’s no surprise that Turner Classic Movies: TCM will be presenting a Dickens double-feature tonight as part of its evening line-up. Neither film is an adaptation of “A Christmas Carol,” though there are several in TCM’s holiday rotation. There must be something up with the rights to the 1951 version, with Alastair Sim as the definitive Scrooge, since the network is always passing over it in favor of the inferior 1938 version, starring Reginald Owen, even to the point of arranging big screen showings nationwide.

The 1938 version of “A Christmas Carol” is actually a rare example of mediocre Dickens on the silver screen. From the 1930s up through 1951 and the Sim version (released in England as “Scrooge”) – which LOOKS as if it were made in the ‘30s – Dickens enjoyed some very fine advocacy.

One of the best adaptations, of course, is David Lean’s “Great Expectations” (1946), with its atmospheric touches and top-notch cast (Alec Guinness made his film debut as Herbert Pocket). It takes some liberties with the novel, especially toward the end, but who cares? This is as idiomatic a film version of Dickens as one is likely to get. The same could be said for Lean’s “Oliver Twist” (1948), again with Guinness (brilliant, though controversial, as Fagin).

I often wonder if there is something in the black and white cinematography – and, in the case of some of the British productions, the often limited budgets – that just makes them seem more authentic, both because of their sense of history – these obviously being films of the distant past – but also because of the effectiveness of the at times murky technology in conjuring an atmosphere akin to that of dreams and fairy tales – which is how I often view films made in the ‘30s.

The 1951 version of “A Christmas Carol” is made even better by the at times indistinct images. This is exactly how I imagine things to have looked in Dickens’ day – although, of course, it is complete nonsense. Everything then was as vivid and mundane as it is now. Yet put modern actors in immaculate stove pipe hats and capture the images with sharp, state-of-the-art technology, and it all seems like play acting. There’s something cheap-looking about it, like a “Masterpiece ” (formerly “Masterpiece Theater”) import, where most of the budget is spent on costume rentals and hiring Judy Dench.

I mean, Judy Dench is a fine actress, but she is nowhere near as Dickensian as Edna May Oliver, who plays Aunt Betsy in “David Copperfield” (1935). It was one of producer David O. Selznick’s lifelong ambitions to get “Copperfield” on the big screen in a respectable, mostly faithful form, and despite some stunt casting (W.C. Fields as Micawber), it really works. There is no way any movie featuring Basil Rathbone, Elsa Lanchester, Lionel Barrymore and Una O’Connor can be bad.

TCM will show “Great Expectations” tonight at 8 ET, and “David Copperfield” at 10:15.

I also highly recommend “A Tale of Two Cities” (1935), “Nicholas Nickleby” (1947) and “The Pickwick Papers” (1952) as further examples of early, murky, delectable Dickens. Later adaptations are more comprehensively faithful, perhaps, yet somehow manage to lose much of the flavor of the original novels. Dickens’ appeal may be timeless, but the costumes and character ticks just seem to suit those times (circa 1935 to 1952) much better than our own.

To keep it musical, here is a suite from Richard Addinsell’s score for “A Christmas Carol,” from 1951:

Addinsell, of course, is the composer of the “Warsaw Concerto.” His suite will be among the selections I’ll be playing this Friday evening at 6, on “Picture Perfect,” as I offer up a “literary Christmas,” at http://www.wwfm.org.