MERRY CHRISTMAS! Balladeer’s Blog’s Christmas Carol-a-Thon 2022 comes to a close with this look at Simon Callow’s one man show A Christmas Carol. Under Tom Cairns’ direction, Callow’s lauded performance, this time taking place in an abandoned warehouse, gets just enough goosing from smoke, sound effects, fake snow and other enhancements to justify capturing it on film.
Callow even lights a fire at one point and in another portion warms his hands over a lit candle, Bob Cratchit style. The only score consists of ambient electronic music from Ben and Max Ringham.
Simon Callow has surpassed Patrick Stewart’s old one-man performance of the Carol in recent decades and he even portrayed Charles Dickens himself doing a public reading of A Christmas Carol in a Doctor Who special in 2005. Like Patrick Stewart, Callow uses Dickens’ old prompt copy for public readings as his launching point but acts out each character in a far more impressive manner than Stewart ever did. Continue reading
A few years back, when Balladeer’s Blog reviewed 
Prior to 1985, Korvatunturi was considered Santa’s home, which is why I suspect that I Met Father Christmas may have been part of a 1984 publicity push regarding Finland’s upcoming “official” re-designation of Rovaniemi as the site of Santa’s workshop and village. Rovaniemi’s airport is just a mile away from Santa Claus Village. 
In the years since then, Rovaniemi has become more and more entrenched as the home of Santa and his workshop. A Christmas special called Lapland Out was filmed there as part of Tots TV, as was the Bam Margera movie Where The #$&% Is Santa? Hell, even a Lordi heavy metal music video was filmed there for their song Hardrock Hallelujah. (That overhead line marks the actual Arctic Circle.) 
Santa Claus Village seems like a fantastic spot for a family vacation if you don’t mind traveling, and if you don’t mind the frigid outside conditions. There are sleigh rides powered by reindeer (above right), snowmobile touring, dogsledding, a petting zoo, an Elf Academy 
Balladeer’s Blog’s Christmas Carol-A-Thon 2022 continues! Back in the 2012 edition I reviewed 
Balladeer’s Blog’s Christmas Carol-A-Thon 2022 rolls along with Ponsett’s Christmas Carol. Back during 2013’s Carol-A-Thon I reviewed The Trail to Christmas (1957), Jimmy Stewart’s television adaptation of this particular radio play. 
A CHRISTMAS CAROL (1997) – This musical cartoon version of the Dickens classic was produced by DIC, the animators known for the early Real Ghostbusters and Sonic the Hedgehog cartoons. The animation quality is adequate but nothing outstanding. However, I will say I find this version’s animation superior to that in the 1982 Australian cartoon A Christmas Carol. 
A CHRISTMAS CAROL (1982) – Burbank Films of Australia produced this mediocre at best animated version of the Dickens classic. Previously I reviewed the 1969 Australian cartoon version and if you were to go strictly by this 1982 rendition of A Christmas Carol you would think that Australian animation technology had not progressed one bit since 1969.
BLACKADDER’S CHRISTMAS CAROL – Balladeer’s Blog’s 13th Annual Christmas Carol-A-Thon continues! Long-time readers know what a big fan I am of Rowan Atkinson’s work – especially his Blackadder programs. Hell, I’m even an enormous fan of his more serious work in Full Throttle. And I never tire of telling anyone who will listen that I think he’d make a perfect Dikaiopolis in Aristophanes’ comedy The Acharnians. 
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