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Editor's Note: This blog was intended to be posted before Christmas, but due to some difficulties with the transition to a new server, it was delayed.

Christmas is only two days away and I couldn't be more excited. I'm the kind of guy who dives head first into the holiday season and embraces it so tightly that it's borderline inappropriate. I'm the kind of guy whose car radio is tuned into the 24 hour Christmas carol channels, whose cubicle at work has a miniature tree wrapped in multi-colored lights, and whose over-the-top decorating efforts include nailing a plastic, illuminated Santa Claus to the roof of my garage despite an intense fear of heights and lack of coordination with a hammer. At any minute, I'm in danger of crushing my hand and plummeting to my death, but damn it, you can see that Santa Claus from 100 yards away! The holiday season is not complete for me though, until I have watched (at least once) my canonical triumvirate of the best Christmas films: the immortal A Christmas Story, the last great National Lampoon's movie, Christmas Vacation, and one of the best adaptations of "A Christmas Carol," Scrooged. In my experience, most people have seen, or at least heard of, the first two films on that list (with quite polarized reactions to Ralphie's quest for a Red Ryder BB Gun with a compass in the stock and this thing that tells time), but I'm often met with raised eyebrows upon mention of Scrooged. It's one of the best and definitely the funniest adaptation of the classic novel that has been adapted way too many times, yet despite the big name lead (Bill Murray) and director (Richard Donner) no one seems to have ever heard of it.
So maybe this installment of "I Don't Get It" is a thinly veiled excuse for me to gush about one of my favorite Christmas films. So what? Give me a break, it's Christmas! On a serious note though, I'm mystified as to why Scrooged isn't on heavy rotation during the holiday season or why it's so poorly received by critics. With a 61% from Rotten Tomatoes' T-Meter Critics and a dreadful 17% from its Top Critics, the film is chided as being "appallingly unfunny," an "exercise in hypocrisy," and "rowdy stuff for the light in head." These critiques no doubt stem from the fact that the film's co-writers - Mitch Glazer and Michael O'Donoghue - were once writers for Saturday Night Live; not exactly the most emotionally substantial show of the past few decades. The result is a script that overloads the jokes and physical humor and lacks the heart and emotional resonance of many Christmas movies. But let's be honest here - if you want the cockles of your heart warmed, then dig up Frank Capra. This film rides on the comic shoulders of Bill Murray and he knocks out of the park every single joke that O'Donoghue lobs for him - no doubt an added advantage of them working together on SNL.

Updating "A Christmas Carol" to a modern context, Scrooged gives us Bill Murray as Frank Cross, the President of IBC television, whose motto is "we'll own Christmas." He's unsympathetic, he's sarcastic, he's a miser and suffering the brunt of his abuse is Grace Cooley (Alfre Woodard), his underpaid, African-American receptionist from Harlem whose youngest child, Calvin (Nicholas Philips), has been a self-imposed mute ever since he saw his father killed six years prior. By now everyone knows the plot of "A Christmas Carol," so everyone knows what to expect: warnings, ghosts, new leaves turned over, etc. Facing this challenge, Donner responds with an eclectic cast with whom Murray can banter and fills the background with enough fun and sarcastic nuggets to poke fun at TV and the egos involved. IBC, for instance, is run by Preston Rhinelander (Robert Mitchum), a man so blinded by money that he proposes Frank include pet appeal - mice with antlers, a cop who dangles string - to attract animal viewers (not viewers with animals, but animals who watch TV) to their live Christmas Eve broadcast of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" (called "Scrooge" in the film for unknown reasons). Other highlights of IBC's holiday programming include "Christmas in the Bayou," in which Robert Goulet sings carols while rowing through the swamps of New Orleans, and "The Night the Reindeer Died," an action film in which Santa's workshop is invaded by terrorists and saved by Lee Majors.


But it's Murray at his comedic finest that really allows Scrooged to shine. Murray oozes sarcasm and condescension through his mannerisms and eyes better than any actor out there and it's this ability that enhances the character of the likable asshole. Here, he responds to a censor who is upset with the use of the Solid Gold Dancers in "Scrooge":

- Censor: Specifically, I can see her nipples.
- Frank: I want to see her nipples!
- Censor: But this is a CHRISTMAS show!
- Frank: Well, Charles Dickens would've wanted to see her nipples.

I mentioned the supporting cast as well and they deliver phenomenally. The film's got David Johansen (perhaps better known as Buster Poindexter) as the crude, drinking, smoking, taxi-driving Ghost of Christmas Past and also features a memorable performance by Carol Kane as the Ghost of Christmas Present, a soft-spoken, fairy-like spirit whose feminine exterior belies a tough side that won't hesitate to smack Frank in the face with a toaster. "Oooh, you know I like the rough stuff, Frank" she quips after Cross threatens to rip her wings off. Bobcat Goldthwaite makes an appearance as Elliot Loudermilk, the executive fired for speaking out against Frank's "Scrooge" promo, which ends up scaring an elderly woman to death, who returns later as an unemployed drunk with a shotgun.

Along the way, Frank of course un-Scrooges and reconciles with his long lost love, Clair Phillips (Karen Allen), on the way to becoming a kinder, gentler boss who interrupts the live "Scrooge" broadcast to declare his own, on the spot message filled with Christmas spirit. It's the most touching moment of the film and seems to be genuinely imbued with a personal touch that leaves a stuttering Murray in tears as he finally declares, "I get it now." I get it too. I get it every year and that's why I continue to watch Scrooged time and time again. I want you to get it too.

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