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exchanges and talks about his love of profit. This flip-flopping makes Scrooge's transformation more gradual and believable.

An excellent actor, Patrick Stewart often adds small gestures that go a long way. You see Scrooge tapping his foot to the dancing at Fezziwig's, and in the previous scene, as he sees his young self and Dick Wilkins bolt to shutter the shop, Scrooge takes a moment to look over the legers his younger self was writing, and nods with approval at the work.

Liberties with the story (all good): The film opens with the somber funeral procession of Jacob Marley. No crowd of mournersjust Scrooge walking behind the hearse-carriage, and signing the death register.

Later, when the two gentleman approach Scrooge for a donation to the poor, Scrooge comments, "I take it you gentlemen are new to the district."

I absolutely love the scene where Scrooge goes into church: The amusing moment where the usher is quietly trying to show Scrooge to remove his hat, and the beautiful moment where he steps into the pew but can't remember the words to "God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman." The man next to him shares his prayer book, and within a moment the words come flooding back as Ebenezer joyfully sings the carol.

The scene where Scrooge tells Bob he's about to raise his salary and help his family is priceless - Scrooge goes to embrace his clark, and Cratchit grabs the fireplace poker to fend him off it's hysterical and very in character.

The scene at the end, where Scrooge is enjoying a roaring fire in his home, dressed in his finest, and invites the Cratchit family into his home for dinner beautiful.

The Not-So-Good: The film does look a bit too much like a "TV movie" at times; the shots are a little too static in places (although that may have been the intentto make this look more like a stage play) and sometimes the sets look a little too much like a studio back lot and aren't as rich as other interpretations of the story.

The Ghost of Christmas Present is played by Desmond Barrit, a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company. Certainly an accomplished actor, but his performance here is frankly not very compelling - his Ghost of Christmas Present just seems a little too subdued for my taste. In stage productions and other versions the Ghost of Present is larger than life, laughing, boisterous, but Barrit's ghost is a little too laid back. While the dialogue is dead on, this ghost just doesn't seem all that interested in the job he has to do - think of it as a worker "phoning

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