Jim Carrey gets to goof off a bit later on in the film, but from the start, his dialogue as Ebenezer Scrooge is not only quite authentic-sounding, but occasionally verbatim from the book. The timid Bob Cratchit, voiced by Gary Oldman, is a sad but lovable figure, and Colin Firth voice-acts his heart out as Scrooge's nephew Fred. It's all very Dickensian. Then the ghosts arrive. Oldman doubles as the voice of the ghost of Jacob Marley, and he shows his range with his roars of despair. (He also voices Tiny Tim, which is impressive, although Tim is a very minor character here.) Even Bob Hoskins, Cary Elwes and Robin Wright Penn join in the fun, voicing multiple characters each. I'm not normally a fan of celebrity cartoon voices, but here they make sense and are done well.

The remaining three ghosts are played by Carrey with high degrees of creepiness. As the Ghost of Christmas Past, Carrey is depicted as a flickering candle-person, who speaks in a whisper and softly moans as his head darts from side to side, which is as nightmarish as it sounds. As the Ghost of Christmas Present, Carrey reaches down and produces a deep voice and a booming laugh unlike anything I've ever heard from him, and the falseness of it makes more sense as you spend more time with him, and see what he keeps under his cloak (readers of the book already know). The Ghost of Christmas Future doesn't speak, as far as I could tell, but exists as an ever-pointing shadow, directing Scrooge to his death. Standard, but creepy nonetheless.

The film occasionally indulges in 3D tricks, but usually for the purposes of the story, as Marley heaves his hellish weights into the Scrooge's bedroom, or Scrooge soars among the chimneys and spires of London. There is one Christmas Future scene, when he's shrunk to a small size to witness the betrayal of his servants, where we're subjected to a miniature chase and some drainpipe-sliding, but it's all over soon enough. While I wouldn't recommend it to any small children -- it is a fairly scary story, after all -- I do think any adult without an irrational hatred of Jim Carrey would find it entertaining, with a lot of scares and the occasional Carrey-provided laugh.

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