Well, it took him three tries, but Zemeckis has finally wowed me with his 3D motion-capture animation. I think he found a balance in making the images "painterly" enough (while still insanely detailed), and having the characters be "cartoony" enough, that he avoids falling into the uncanny valley. This was also the first one of these animations that I've gotten to see in digital 3D, and both the process and Zemeckis' usage of it are jaw-dropping!
As for the movie itself, I was expecting the worst, and aside from one protracted sequence involving the Ghost of Christmas Future which felt like it was added to beef up the running time and show off the animation, this was a strikingly faithful adaptation. The spirit and, indeed, much of the language of Dickens' original was well-maintained, and Carrey (with ample help from the animators) was a surprisingly credible Scrooge. The rest of the casting was great, and I noticed a number of small touches which were overlooked in other adaptations made it into this one. The shifts in tone from festive to somber to downright scary were handled extremely well...I loved that they pulled no punches with the ghoulish stuff! And somehow, all the fancy shots flying over and through London, which could've come off as merely flashy, really worked wonderfully in this context.
Overall, a classic story done justice with some cutting-edge technology. Definitely see this in a theater while it's out there...I think I might make a return visit myself.
