MY RATING: 7 OUT OF 10

It’s been a thin month for movie releases ahead of the school holidays and the predictable rash of sugar coated happily ever after film releases. However this lull has allowed me to catch up on those films that have been placed in the ‘also ran’ bin, and I have found 2 gems in a week!

Chloe is a thrilling erotic adventure with some of the best acting we’ve seen out of Amanda Seyfreid to date! The direction lulls you in to a wild ride as more of the plot is revealed. The premise for this film is a bit on the offbeat side, but I like offbeat if it’s done well., and this one ticks all the boxes. Julianne Moore character hires Seyfried to check out if her husband has a wandering eye; played by the ever talented Liam Neeson. The story that unfolds takes you on a journey where you judgments of who is right or wrong will flip and turn……..

The film builds, as some do, on human frailty, fear, miscommunication and misunderstanding, sprinkled with a liberal dose of leaping to conclusions and making rash assumptions. That little voice inside me was whispering to me, “Why can people not be more honest and forthcoming in their dealings with loved ones.”. Nothing in human relations could be more important but is more neglected.

Amanda Seyfried is outstanding in her role as Chloe, a world away from her bubbly “Mamma Mia” character. However Julianne Moore’s portrayal of a woman struggling with multiple roles (Dr, wife, Mum) compiled with age-related self questioning is brilliant. You can’t help empathising then questioning how and why as each piece of her role unfolds.

In American Beauty, Thomas Newman delivered a haunting soundtrack and Mychael Danna’s score through this film truly sets the drama and thriller threads through this movie. Another aspect is the very clever cinematography and the location in a cold, snow swept Toronto that adds to the chill in this film.

Chloe is a sparkling sexy thriller that I wholly recommend. The plot, the acting, the music and the casting work, oh and you will not guess the ending.

My Rating: 7.5 out of 10
Robert DeNiro’s Acting is More than Fine…

Based on Guiseppe Tornatore’s 1990 Italian film, Stanno tutti bene, writer/director Kirk Jones has brought some of the best work out of Robert DeNiro in decades. Everybody’s Fine is a fascinating tale about Frank (DeNiro), a widower who wants to get his four adult children together for dinner, but when one by one they all cancel for good reasons or lack of a better word excuses, he decides against the advice of his doctor, to make a surprise trip to all their residences in New York, Chicago, Denver, and Las Vegas. What the trip brings him however, is a heavy realization that despite what his late-wife told him, maybe everybody’s not fine.

Treading heavy territory to resemble films like About Schmidt, Everybody’s Fine is a heartfelt, emotional film that will leave you in tears. Though the narrative could come off a bit over-dramatic at times, there’s no denying the warmth that the film conveys to family and loyalty. DeNiro is most effective in his role of Frank Goode, the hard-working father whose long hours putting up coating on telephone wire may have cost him more than he thought. Director, Kirk Jones makes some great artistic choices, especially in the final scenes of the film. One thing however that is surprising is how the film is being marketed. Portraying itself as a holiday-comedy is going to be quite unexpected to viewers as the film is weighty with emotion and less on the laughs.

The supporting players, in this case the adult children, are all beautifully cast. Drew Barrymore has never been sweeter in the role of Rosie, a dancer in Vegas with a “Daddy’s Girl” mentality. Kate Beckinsale is stunning in looks and adequate in delivery as Amy, a top advertisement executive. Sam Rockwell, who is long overdue for Oscar attention, plays Robert, the musician who painfully seeks his father’s approval.

Enough can’t be said about DeNiro who gives one of his finest performances of his career. Showing a softer side yet remaining in tuned with his fatherly instincts, DeNiro has redeemed some of his lesser works in the past years. He takes in some of the best and worst parts of all fathers’ across the world. Worrying yet too hard at times it spills over into his children’s decisions. Where the narrative misses in some aspects, DeNiro makes up for with his devotion and commitment to the character. It’s an outstanding turn for him in his late career.

Over-dramatic, cliché, and a bit predictable, Everybody’s Fine shows a beating heart. There’s no stupidity or attitude in its form, just pure feeling. If you come from a family of secrets for the greater good (which may be the majority of us), this will speak volumes.

When you’re at the quacks for a regular medical and (s)he tells you should really lose a few pounds as you are in the ‘overweight’ category I am sure most of us think “Yeah but could be a lot worse” and take no remedial course of action as there has been no health impact. In the past 12 months this has also been the state of most developed Western Economies.

First we had the Credit Crunch, then we are in recession, then out of recession and in the past few months it’s all been talk of deficit and debt. But what real impact has this had to the (wo)man on the street? Most ‘hard working families’ have probably been a bit better off with record low interest rates knocking hundreds of pounds a month of their mortgage commitments and allowing a pain-free spending spree for many.

As a result in 2009 when the motor industry and cruising had a dire start to the year, by the time we got the second half of the year, people were used this extra cash in their pocket and generally feeling better off. Job cuts had not been as bad as feared, there was no housing market crash, so why worry? Yes the TV news rambled on about deficits and borrowing but it was not actually affecting many people. In the UK a General Election meant no party was going to do anything rash to begin to balance the books ( and hence make themselves unpopular) so the country continued signing blank cheques to cushion the recession blow.

So in 2009 and 2010 there has been a surge on spending and the cruise industry has been a very happy chappy. Bookings up 10%+ early this year, bright shiny new ships capturing new interest, and in response (and with more than a little arrogance) the cruise lines RAISED their prices to cash in on the boom.

However, the General Election has passed, we’ve seen an Emergency Budget that will take a couple of hundred pounds a year out of most working people via TAX and VAT rises. And in the Autumn the spending review will start seriously cutting public funding that can only result in public sector job losses. This will also cut major infrastructure and IT projects so there will also be hundreds of thousands of private sector jobs under threat as well.

“Yeah but we keep hearing this on the news every day, so what”, I hear you ask; well I remember writing a similar blog back in 2008 about the outlook for the first half of 2009 and we certainly did have a very problematic 6 months. But this post is titled “The Perfect Cruising Storm” so let me focus on this big market in the travel sector.

There has been a glut of new ships being launched this last year and this year, all of them ordered 2 or 3 years ago when the economic climate was still good. Decadent luxury with Celebrity Equinox and Eclipse, the enormous 6,000 passenger Oasis of the Seas and her sister Allure of the Seas (launching December), some ‘more of the same’ with P&O’s Azura and Ventura. Cunard’s twin sister Queen Elizabeth to pair up with Queen Victoria and the ‘ugly outside, pretty inside’ NCL Norwegian Epic. Come the end of this year there are very few new boats being launched. The ship yards order books for new cruise ships are very empty. The net effect of all these new cruise ships coming on-stream is an uplift in capacity of over 25,000 extra people. These ships need to be 95%+ full 365 days of the year to break even.

“But more people are cruising you said?” Yes that has been the story over the past 12 months as people have become more affluent, pain free. It’s not just the “newly wed and nearly dead” who have been the traditional cruisig types but families seeing the advantage of one price; all food, accommodation and entertainment. With the upcoming spending cuts, and the inevitable job losses, would you comit yourself to a family holiday that costs 50% the price of a new car? It sounds a lot but let me give you a real example from the cruise.co.uk this morning; a family of 2 adults and 2 kids on a fortnights cruise on Independence of the Seas on 6th August 2011 would have to pay £6,444.44 for an outside cabin. Now that’s not even a balcony. This is also a discounted price and not the cruise line brochure fare. Now if you have not familiar with cruise ships or brands Royal Caribbean’s Independence of the Seas is a 4,700 passenger cruise ship sailing out of Southampton that is equivalent to a Center Parcs land based holiday; that is; it is aspirational, but not luxury, but is also considerably more than a Butlins type experience!

According to the Office of National Statistics in 2009 the average UK wage was just over £25k a year in 2009 so to take a family of 4 on this cruise you would require a family to save £537 a month, and that’s before you add on excursions or spending money.

As I write this article on 1 July 2010 there seems to be a growing detachment from the price of a cruise and the economic reality that’s approaching. This has been the boom time for cruising but I have substantial questions about the viability of SOME ships over the next 5 years. Now I am not a doom peddler at all, indeed if what I outline pans out over the next 12 months there will be some amazing bargains to be had. In the past 2 weeks I have seen some very good discounts for cruises this summer with some of the ‘also ran’ cruise ships. That is; cruise ships that are not aimed at families or brand new crowd pullers. One brand consistently appearing on these lists is P&O who seem to be struggling to fill ships right now in the face of stiff competition from Royal Caribbean, Celebrity and Cunard.

Now before we all start rubbing are hands in collective glee with the prospect of bargains, keep in mind that cruise ships are not tied to any country or market. As the developed western economies try to balance the books other parts of the globe are booming and cruise ships can swiftly re-locate. My advice is to hold back until first quarter next year. The cruise conglomerates will be reviewing capacity and potentially discounting to shift cabins, combined with some people who may have booked in the rush this year but can no longer afford the final payment of thousands of pounds. All of the above is written on the assumption that interest rates stay at the record low level, well we all know they can’t and imagine if they begin to rise in 2011…….2011 The Perfect Storm.

I have never been to Disney; it’s just one of those places that I could never see myself connecting with. I have spoken too many and am confident that it is an amazing experience that sticks in a Childs mind for a lifetime. What makes it not appealing to me is the whole pretence of pretend, trying to be so many things at once, copying other places in the world, recreated with a look and feel of the original.

I find myself drawing parallels as I sit aboard Independence of the Seas writing this review.

Check-in at Southampton was less than smooth. I queued in the car to get into the port, queued to get my case unloaded, queued to get into the waiting area before security, queued to check in. Over an hour and a half to get from arrival at the dock gates to finally embarking. Not that the delays ended there, my case did not arrive until after dinner (8pm) and if you wanted to try and speak to guest relations; join the long, long line. Now Oasis of the Seas, with it’s 6,000 passengers and based in Florida, manages to get kerbside to cabin in 15 mins. Why must we pay 3 or 4 times the price of a cruise in the USA to experience this poor service departing Southampton? This needs to change.

This is my fourth of six cruises this year and as I walked onto the ship she it was as impressive as I had thought. She’s big, very big and immediate impression was lots of people, and no ship guide in the stateroom. Thankfully outside each lift there is illuminated cut-away of the ship so you can see where you are in relation to everything around you.

The main feature of all ‘Freedom class’ ships is the Royal Promenade; a ‘mall style’ 6 deck high alley that goes down the centre of the ship. Like a mall it has shops and pubs each side trying to sell you items over and above the cost of the cruise. Each shop or bar is individually styled to make it feel like something else. The Dog and Badger pub which is presented like an old Tudor English pub, Sorrento’s an Italian style café across the way serving pizza 24 hours a day, or Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream etc

I was blessed with the weather on this cruise with sun and temperatures above 25 celcius every day, so relaxing at the side of the impressive Flo-rider or sipping my favourite BBC cocktail at the pool side sky bar were delightful times. Independence is now sailing year round from Southampton and with no indoor pool and so much public entertainment space in and around the pools on decks 11 & 12, sailing from Southampton on a cold, dark February evening would not be fun.

This ship houses over 1,000 more passengers than Queen Mary 2 and is only slightly bigger and as I strolled round the Deck 12 area it certainly felt like it. Every sun lounger had a either a person or a checked-out towel laying on it. You have to present your room Sea Pass card to get a Pool Towel and if not returned you get charged $20. So despite notices requesting people do not take a sun lounger for more than 30 minutes most were there for the afternoon. There were a few times the number of people became an issue, the captain’s address in the Royal Promenade on Formal Night was certainly a squeeze as was the 40 min queue to buy a fridge magnet on the last night……

The Royal Promenade is deprived of any connection to the sea or the fact you are on a cruise, no glass roof to the sky being completely encased and artificially lit, no windows to the ocean (only small windows in two of the bars looking at lifeboats). It is a celebration of consumerism; a cathedral to shopping and, for me, adds nothing to the cruise experience that I could not get in my local shopping centre on a Saturday afternoon.

I did find the whole imitation theme; the Romeo & Juliet, Macbeth, King Lear, Anthony & Cleopatra and Othello named dining rooms; the Pyramid Lounge complete with fake Cleopatra’s needle outside, the stale smoke drenched Labyrinth nightclub complete with fake stained glass, gothic chairs and pews felt more like a gothic S&M dungeon; Sorrentos the 24 hour pizza outlet complete with 24 hour Italian jukebox, a plastic Morgan car and so on. It all had a veneer of reality that was only as thick as the painted coating.

Why could not the largest cruise ship in Europe have the confidence to be original, to create something that is not just lifted from the text book of history or a copy of something else, but actually tried to bring something new to the party? Royal Caribbean had a chance to really impress and set a new standard that OTHERS could have aspired to, but fell way short. From the looks of Oasis of the Seas, they may have found it again.

The food was OK but not memorable. I steak on the first night arrived overcooked and tough as leather, though most meals in the Romeo & Juliet dining room were edible though not exciting. No four courses here like Cunard or Celebrity. Service was good, though hard sold; It was disclosed to me, after I had completed the questionnaire, that if you had marked ‘Good’, ‘Fair’ or ‘Poor’ on the end of cruise survey they count as minus points to the staff you are rating. Only the highest rank of ‘Excellent’ counts as a positive. So the effort of the waiting staff to impress, and to make sure you turned up on the last night to give them the gratuities envelope, was way to pushy. Joy and Robert our waiters were excellent, even though the dining room we were in was less than half full.

It’s the impersonal approach and the little things I missed on this cruise: No bathrobe, no slippers and no chocolate on the pillow last thing at night (Cunard & Celebrity). No real dress code in the main dining room with jeans and shorts at dinner and breakfast. No extra little cakes after dinner or Bread basket and dips on the table (Celebrity)

However it I was looking to take the family on a cruise this would be top of my list. The FloRider surf simulator with the wrap around seating was a great place to see experts and beginners try out surfing. For the more adventurous the rock-climbing wall was open each day adjacent to the basketball court. And for the under 8’s the H2O zone with its water jets and vortex pool would be a hit.
The ice rink shows on Deck 3 studio B were impressive, 10 skaters pulled from national teams (mainly Russian) executed a through the ages show called Freeze-Frame with great precision. And the Showtime shows in the 1,300 seat Alhambra Theatre were good, especially the Once Upon A Time show on the last night.

As I walked round the ship at sunset one night I passed the windows to the Adventure Ocean kids club and there were toddlers dashing about the place in supervised activities and older kids in the Fuel Teen Club; I did agree that as a family holiday this ship offers both family and adult time with the peace of mind if knowing the kids are safe and having fun, rather than bored and left behind.

Even though this was half term week and the waiter imparted that there was 800 kids on board, the organisation was such that at dinner we were in a quite dining area and families, couples and solo cruisers were well grouped.

To summarise, Independence of the Seas is mass-cruising, how best to cope with the number of passengers. It is mass catering, mass entertaining and mass movement of people, I felt as unique as my stateroom number throughout.

This is not a classy five star ship. It has been designed for the mass family UK market with a bit of something for everyone and at this level it succeeds on all counts. If I were boarding Independence as my first cruise I would be wowed by the experience and everything on offer.

If you have cruised before then this will probably meet all of your expectations for RCI. It’s a good cruise ship, but not excellent like Queen Mary 2 or any of the Celebrity Solstice class ships (owned by the same corporate). This is solid four star family fun.

Facts and Figures:
At 160,000 tonnes, she weighs more than 80,000 family cars or 32,000 adult elephants.

She is 1,112 feet long. That’s longer than 37 double decker buses, five jumbo jets or 3½ football pitches.

Boasting a width of 185 feet, Independence of the Seas is actually wider than the White House is long (168 feet).

Passengers are spread out over 15 decks. And when the ship’s full, there will be 4,370 of them – that’s 1,008 more than Cunard’s Queen Mary 2. Although usually there are fewer passengers – 3,600 or so.

1,360 crew look after them serving 18,000 slices of pizza per week and 65,000 lbs of fresh vegetables and over 64,000 lbs of fresh fruit on each sailing.

The theatre seats 1,320 guests a time – bigger than many theatres on land – and carries the same number of passengers as three Boeing 747 aircraft.

8 March 2010 – Cunard Line has announced that the world’s grandest ocean liner, its majestic Queen Mary 2, will be based in Australia in 2012 for a history-making circumnavigation which will see her visit five states and the Northern Territory.

Queen Mary 2′s Royal Circumnavigation of Australia is a first for Cunard

The largest ship ever to visit Australia, Queen Mary 2 will call at eight Australian ports during her time Down Under including Sydney, Fremantle, Adelaide and the Whitsundays, as well as maiden visits to Cairns (Yorkey’s Knob), Darwin, Melbourne and Brisbane. Her circumnavigation will also include a call at Bali.

Australians will be able to choose from three circumnavigation options – a 22-night voyage departing Sydney on 14 February 2012, a 20-night voyage departing Fremantle on 8 February 2012 and a 21-night voyage departing Adelaide on 11 February 2012.

In all, Queen Mary 2 will spend 28 nights in Australian waters, as she sails from Cape Town to Sydney via Fremantle and Adelaide, and then circumnavigates the country. As a result, Fremantle, Adelaide and Sydney will each enjoy two visits from the liner during her Australian season.

The Australian deployment will mark the longest period of time that Queen Mary 2 has been based in one country outside of her northern hemisphere home ports of Southampton and New York.

Peter Shanks, president of Cunard Line, said, “Cunard has strong and proud links with Australia, going back many years.”

“Recognising the enduring appeal and increased demand from Australians for the unique Cunard Line experience, we are delighted to offer this series of legendary voyages for our flagship Queen Mary 2 in Australia 2012,” he said.

The Royal Circumnavigation of Australia will go on sale this spring as part of the announcement of the 2012 World Voyage programme.

Tags: Australia, Cruising, QM2

MY RATING: 3 OUT OF 10

A few years back I joined the Cineworld Unlimited club, £13 a month and watch as many movies as you want. This means that over a month you get to see some great, and not so great new movies. Have You Heard About The Morgans is firmly in the later.

Romantic-comedy regulars Hugh Grant and Sarah Jessica Parker finally unite in this fish-out-of-water laugher. The actors play Paul and Meryl Morgan, a Manhattan couple whose marriage is in danger. But it turns out all they may need is a change of scenery: when the Morgans witness a murder and are sent by the government to small-town Wyoming to hide from the killers, their marriage shows signs of recovery. DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THE MORGANS? also stars Sam Elliott, Mary Steenburgen, and Elisabeth Moss.

Why Hugh signed up for this is the biggest mystery. A tired format whose only surprise was the fact there were none. Expect this to have a shot run at the cinema and a speedy DVD release. Not worth spending money to see on the big screen given the other great movies round at the moment

MY RATING: 7.5 OUT OF 10

Up in the Air is a drama worthy of director Jason Reitman’s name as he has once again delivered a cleverly written drama that has many layers of depth to keep viewers questioning its actual point.

As seen in other films by Reitman such as “Juno” and “Thank You for Smoking”, his humor shines through with a bit of ironic sarcasm and biting reality in situations that generally one should not be laughing about, but yet somehow can’t stop from cracking a grin.

Already showered with a sprinkling of Golden Glove nominations, Up in the Air the movie is based on a novel that was written by Walter Kim, which writers Sheldon Turner and Reitman turned into a clever movie with isolated characters who learn to deal with each other although their agendas are strict.

Of course, apart from the wonderful reality bites aside moments and human characters, a large part of the reason why it is so easy to engage and admire the film is because the star of the film is George Clooney who is simply hard to hate.

Clooney does not disappoint as he delivers a poignant role that is both provoking and memorable. He plays the part of Ryan Bingham who has spent his life flying all over the US to fire people to save CEOs from the trouble.

Of course, this lifestyle is not to last as a woman who changes up the procedure quickly changes the shape of his lifestyle and personality which is where the fun really starts to start in this cut and dry lovely movie.

Up in the Air opens this Friday

MY REVIEW: 3 out of 10
It’s not a fatal flaw for a film to start with a statement which is patently untrue. ‘Casablanca’ made the dubious claim that the North African city of the same name was a key point of departure for refugees from Nazi-occupied Europe, but it didn’t exactly hurt the movie.

And though this is the only time you’ll hear ‘Nativity’ mentioned alongside one of the greatest movies in Hollywood history, it’s not an enormous problem that this film is based on a premise which is similarly hard to swallow: that anyone other than the children taking part or their family members is that interested in a school Nativity play.

It’s not true, but it’s harmless enough. What’s wrong with the film is that it’s unconvincing and lazy on a much more fundamental level.

Admittedly it has a certain amount of charm built in thanks to the presence of some cute kids, and is astutely cast with a kind of ‘Who’s Who?’ of modern British comedy performers, all of whom deliver confident performances. But also familiar performances; none of them are called upon to do anything they haven’t done before.

However this overlong, shoddily-directed film saves the worst until last, with not just a taste of the Nativity entertainment that’s been in preparation but several whole numbers, all of them dreadful, and which I only wish were instantly forgettable. I haven’t enjoyed myself less at the cinema in years, and speaking as someone who loves Christmas, those songs almost put me right off it – for life.

MY RATING: 4.5 out of 10
The tagline for the film is “We were warned”, well I saw the trailer, saw it was 158 mins long, read the synopsis and buy should I have paid closer attention the tagline. Take a dollop of Deep Impact, a squeeze of Day After Tomorrow, the tail of Titanic, the heart of Armageddon, the tail of Posideon Adventure, throw it all in the blender and out it splurges in an inedible dollop. With that in mind let’s focus on the positives…..

The film follows mostly two groups of people who are dealing with the end of the world in the year 2012. We start off with Dr. Adrian Helmsley (Chiwetel Ejiofor) in 2009 learning that solar activity has caused the Earth’s core to heat up. We follow the next few years as he works with Chief of Staff Carl Anheuser (Oliver Platt) on researching the issue and finding a solution (it’s just as enigmatic in the movie as it is in my description). Eventually we make it to 2012, where Helmsley and crew realize that things are going to get worse a lot quicker than they thought.

Also in the title year, we meet Jackson Curtis (John Cusack), novelist and bad parent/husband, which explains why his wife lives with another man now. He takes his kids on a camping trip to Yellowstone, where he meets Mr. Charlie Frost. Frost is a self-proclaimed prophet who believes the world will end in 2012 because the Earth’s core will melt, leaving the crust to move around (”shift”), creating every known geological disaster at once. He also knows about a conspiracy in which spaceships are being built to save those with money to buy a seat. We soon realize he’s correct, and Jackson takes his family on wild ride to get to the ships.

I know everyone wants to know about the one thing you are really going to see the film for: the special effects. They were good, as to be expected, but they were mind-numbing at times. There was so much destruction going on that it was kind of hard to take it all in. Any scenes where people were involved in the destruction instantly became more interesting, and I thought as a whole they were done very well. Unfortunately, there were many less “Wow” moments that I would have thought to see in a film like this. I was simply underwhelmed.

That being said, the plot for the film bordered on absurd. Sure, the technology and the natural disasters we see are explained in a way that makes them seem reasonable (as if that mattered to us), but I found it convenient that Curtis and crew were always one step ahead of the destruction. The probability of them surviving the trip they made from Los Angeles to China is so small, that if I made a bet on it, I could afford multiple seats on one of the ships. There are so many “well, that’s convenient” moments that you start to roll your eyes after a while. The overall story is pretty thin, but there’s so much action that you almost don’t even notice it.

What you do notice, however, is the wide range in dialogue quality in the script. There are scenes (especially with Curtis’ kids), where they are very on the nose and almost Michael Bay-ish with the humor. However, there are some very touching moments between characters when they know one isn’t going to survive. Yes, at times the film is cheesy and unbelievable, but I have to admit that scenes like the one between Helmsley and his father definitely moved me.

I don’t want to give any spoilers, but I will say that one of the things that made me the most mad was the ending. Other than the fact that the end itself was very “and they all lived happily…”, the plot surrounding the climax was silly and of course one nation saved the world, again. The message was clear, but the results weren’t as satisfying as they made it seem.

All in all, when you see 2012, you are getting what you paid for: Tons of CGI destruction, an ensemble of characters that mirror characters you have seen before that come together at the end, Oh yeah, and cheesy humor and unbelievable luck.

MY RATING: 7 out of 10
Now first thing’s first, there is only one true version of Christmas Carol, and as people of my age will tell you, that’s The Muppets Christmas Carol…… “..after all there’s only one more sleep ’til christmas” and other such tunes. But enough reminiscing, let’s deal with this year’s festive version. You the know the story inside out by now, .. so what more can be squeezed out of this Dickens classic….

After directing The Polar Express in 2004, Robert Zemeckis vowed to only make 3D movies using motion-capture technology from then on, never to return to traditional live action films again. What? How could he? Moviegoers everywhere were bemused at how the bloke who gave us Forrest Gump, the Back to the Future trilogy, Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, Contact and Cast Away could settle for some silly 3D business. Perhaps Zemeckis was smarter than us all though, his pledge to developing a decent 3D output coming half a decade earlier than most. It seems he was on to something.

It is credit to Zemeckis though that his use of 3D isn’t the drawcard for this wonderfully told fable, it purely enhances it. The opening title sequence is one of the most breathtaking of the year, as we soar over – and through – the old Victorian town in which Scrooge inhabits in only one shot. It doesn’t end there however, with no less than two more flying scenes and a splendid chase sequence on foot, which capably show what mo-cap and 3D are capable of. One small gripe, as was present with Up, the glasses still make everything darker and subsequently duller; especially as this picture is intentionally not well-lit to begin with.

We all know the famous Charles Dickens novel for which this is based on and Zemeckis stays faithfully close to it, unworried about making a family movie that has very few laughs. Let’s face it, the story of Scrooge isn’t meant to be a light-hearted laughfest. With demonic horses (complete with glaring red eyes), ghosts with broken jaws and men withering away to a skeleton, this is anything but a hoot. But is that a bad thing? Not at all. In fact it is a relief to see a movie for young (but not too young) and old that doesn’t shy away from evoking feelings of fear and regret rather than always sugar-coating them with funny moments. If dealt with rightly, emotions like these can be healthy and will have a longer lasting effect on you and your kids than something that only makes you laugh.

Providing the voice of Scrooge from childhood to old-age, along with the three Ghosts of Christmas, Carrey does a fine job, even with his normal over-the-top voicing toned down a few hundred decibels. He is barely recognisable in all his parts – a result that I’m sure Zemeckis would have been aiming for – which allows the characters to stand on their own two feet rather than be a typical Carrey product. The experienced supporting cast of Oldman, Hoskins, Firth, Elwes and Wright Penn add a nice level of class to the proceedings.

The dark and morose atmosphere might at first shock, but ultimately both children and adults will gain more from this experience than most family films. Do not wait for this to come out at home, see it on the big screen in breath taking 3D.