Johnny Depp certainly leaves his mark as the latest to tackle Ebenezer Scrooge, one of the great Christmas-time villains. You’ll likely not soon forget the scene where he pees himself.
No one asked for another retelling of Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol.” But here we are with “Ebenezer,” which breathlessly borrows from modern horror conventions to try to make a Victorian-era story cooler.
“Enough! This nightmare has run its course,” Scrooge screams at the first of three ghosts who warn him he’s awful, and everyone watching has to agree. But alas, more than an hour remains.
Director Ti West ups the macabre with street oil lamps mysteriously snuffing out, the addition of tons of ominous crows, Scrooge being sucked into his bed and legions of graveyard zombies, like out of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” video. He also inexplicably stops all that for an extended, heartfelt performance of “Silent Night” sung by the cast, except for Scrooge, of course.
Nathaniel Halpern’s screenplay returns to Dickens’ text with devotion, including resurrecting a surreal pair of surprises hiding in the chest of the second ghost, which happily weren’t included in the 1992 Muppet version.
But he also adds a few twists of his own, like rewriting love interest Belle, erasing her daughter and giving her authorship of a novel — “An Hour Once Ours,” presumably about her time with Scrooge. He also has a hunky Arthur Conti playing a young Scrooge lustily making out with Belle, which was not expected.
The modern touches grafted onto the classic are a little head-scratching. And if Halpern is behind Scrooge wetting himself, he may have to deal with the ghost of Dickens visiting this Christmas Eve.
Now in his early 60s, Depp lets his oddball character-actor skills do the heavy lifting. Think Edward Scissorhands, Sweeney Todd and the Mad Hatter. Now drain all twinkles, all mirth.
For Scrooge, Depp leans into greasy hair, whiskers, a hunchback, lots of squints and a line delivery mix that’s between Winston Churchill and Scrooge McDuck. This is a Method Scrooge in fingerless gloves. To get into character, he probably didn’t tip his barista for a week.
Surrounding him are some really good actors — Ian McKellen, who, as expected, expertly plays the doomed business partner Marley; Sam Claflin as the affecting nephew Fred; and Tramell Tillman, who brings unsettling energy to the Ghost of Christmas Present.
It’s an interesting choice for Depp, now in his first big Hollywood studio production in eight years after bitter legal battles with his former wife, Amber Heard. What is he trying to say with his Scrooge? That he’s capable of change? Or that he’s broken free of his past? Maybe he’s weighing in on the notion of popularity.
“I was once good, and I swear I can be again,” he wails to the last faceless, voiceless spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Future. “I’m not the man I was.”
“A Christmas Carol” is, in retrospect, a leftist journey: A miserly, affluent capitalist, over the course of a terrible night, learns to care about the destitute, the physically impaired and the imprisoned, and in the end chooses to share his wealth.
Dickens, criticizing those who “weigh everything by gain,” was what we’d call woke these days. Now his story has been turned into a redemption vehicle for a fading star with a fresh Skydance logo attached. Everyone, all together: bah humbug.
“Ebenezer,” a Paramount Pictures release that’s in theaters Friday, is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association for “frightening material.” Running time: 116 minutes. One star out of four.
