"The Muppet Christmas Carol" is one of my all-time favourite movies. Amazingly, it sticks quite close to Dickens' novel, and the use of Dickens' original prose is classy. Michael Caine does a supurb job as Ebenezer Scrooge, being quite believable as the heartless miser, as well as a man who is capable of having a change in heart. The Muppets themselves are great, and throw in just enough irreverance to give the movie its funny spots, and keeping this from being just another retelling of this tale that gets seen a few times and then shelved somewhere to collect dust.
That being said, I must say that I am quite disappointed with the DVD. First of all, this film should be available in widescreen. The sets themselves are so great that it's a pity to have so much of them cut out. Furthermore, there are times, such as in the song "Bless Us All" where they just can't fit all the characters in the screen.
The failure to have this film in widescreen, though, could be forgiven. However, the fact that at least one entire song was cut out "When Love is Gone" is a travesty. That is one of my two favourite songs from the film, and it helps show the point where Scrooge chooses the path he's going to follow. This song, with its scenes between Belle and Ebenezer is just not there. I couldn't believe it. When I buy a film on DVD, I expect the entire thing to be there, (or at least as much as was there on the videocassette that I own).
The other really annoying thing about this DVD is that it looks like they worked with two different German translations - one for the script, and then another for the subtitles. Listening to the film in German, I would guess that only one line in 20 matched what was actually being said to what appeared in the subtitles.
I love this film. I only hope that someday they decide to come out with a quality DVD of it.