Unlike most of the Christmas movies I’ve been getting lately like “A Bad Moms Christmas,” “Love the Coopers,” and “Almost Christmas,” “The Man Who Invented Christmas” is absolute fun. It’s practically a goofy take on how Charles Dickens wrote the book “A Christmas Carol,” and the many inspirations and struggles it took for him to write it.
Dan Stevens stars as Dickens, and the movie starts with his downfall. He has another baby on the way, a new house, a new Irish nanny (Anna Murphy), and is running out of money. Then, he decides to write another book-a Christmas book to be exact.
He ends up meeting the characters he creates, including Ebenezer Scrooge (Christopher Plummer), thus making himself basically part of the book. And his dark past involves his father John (Jonathan Pryce) being thrown in jail for his unpaid debts, and it resulted in poor Charles working in an abusive factory.
“The Man Who Invented Christmas” is far from a masterpiece with certain scenes that look like they were forced to be shot epic and the moments of Charles’ past are hard to watch. But what it succeeds very well is having a goofy fun tone.
And you are given charming performances from Stevens and Plummer. The scenes I like the best regarding these two is when they trade one-liners and bicker about the choices Charles makes for his book. Pryce is also very good as the father, and even Murphy is likable as the Irish nanny. Some nice performances and a holly jolly tone make up for lost time.
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