(Here thar be spoilers.)

Far be it from me to play moral guardian, but I saw the Disney adaptation of A Christmas Carol recently, and the first thing I thought of once the credits started rolling was:

HOW IN THE CHRIST WAS THIS MOVIE NOT RATED PG-13?!

To say this flick is rife with material for traumatizing young kids is doing it a disservice. I was in an audience with numerous parents and kids under 10. Hell, the oldest I saw looked around seven, for fuck's sake. I knew we were in for some deep Victorian horrors when the first scene of the story proper was an extreme closeup of Jacob Marley's dead face, pennies on the eyes and all. Almost immediately I heard a kid go "That guy's scary!" Well, we hadn't seen anything yet.

We had the infamous bit with Marley's face as Scrooge's doorknob. A weird image in itself, but, of course, there's a jump scare when Scrooge reaches out to touch it and then his jaw jumps open. Then Marley himself shows up and throws his counting boxes into Scrooge's bedroom. He does the traditional ghostly screaming and going on about "link by link I forged this chain" and all that, and when Scrooge mentions that he was a good man of business, Marley's ghost gets so worked up that HIS FUCKING LOWER JAWBONE DETACHES AND DANGLES THERE. IN FRONT OF A BUNCH OF FIVE YEAR OLDS.

What.

The.

FUCK, ZEMECKIS?!

Oh, there was a mass exodus after that. Those who stayed witnessed more horrors in the form of the Ghost Of Christmas Present's departure. At the toll of midnight, he literally starts to waste away as the specters of Ignorance and Want are terrorizing Scrooge, and all the while GOCP gets skinnier and skinnier until he turns into an honest-to-God LAUGHING SKELETON straight out of the Uncanny Valley. Accompanied by a close-up of his skull head. And then there's the whole bit with the Ghost Of Christmas Yet To Come. EVIL DEMON COACH, AHOY!

In short, if you have young children, DO NOT TAKE THEM TO SEE THIS VERSION. Have 'em watch the Scrooge McDuck, Mickey Mouse version of the movie and enjoy that. Show 'em the Alistair Sim version. Hell, there's even the Grinch to enjoy! Anything, ANYTHING but this.

And now, my top 10 films of 2009.

10. Star Trek
9. A Serious Man
8. Paranormal Activity
7. I Love You, Man
6. Drag Me To Hell
5. Coraline
4. District 9
3. Inglourious Basterds
2. Anvil! The Story Of Anvil
1. Up

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