In a recession-cursed era blighted by corporate greed it comes as quite an eye-opener to revisit Charles Dickens' classic story of a tight-fisted miser rediscovering life through a new found generosity.
 
(Unfortunately, as has become spirit-sappingly apparent, the same sort of redemption isn't unconditionally being embraced by the cavalier money-men who've plunged Britain into fiscal misery.)
 
We first meet counting-house owner Ebenezer Scrooge (Carrey) meticulously removing the penny coins from the eyes of his dead partner Jacob Marley just before he's consigned to the earth. "Tuppence is tuppence," the old cheapskate reasons.
 
It's Christmas Eve and a cold atmosphere of misery hangs around the wretched tightwad, a demeanour unimproved by the seasonal hospitality extended by his nephew (Firth) or the kindly subservience of his freezing clerk Bob Cratchit (Oldman).

Heading home to his chilly palladian pile, he receives an unexpected visitor...but it's not a rosy-cheeked Santa dispensing pressies, hot punch and the Christmas double-edition Radio Times.

No, it's the manacled spirit of his erstwhile partner Marley, chained by a past of hoarding and meanness.

Marley warns Scrooge that he will be visited by a trio of apparitions...and sure enough he's whisked back to his childhood by the Ghost of Christmas Past, witnesses the poor but decent festivities of the Cratchit family and terrifying glimpses what the future may hold.

Faithfully adapting Dickens' mid-19th century novella, director Zemeckis avoids the bloated overkill of his previous Xmas offering The Polar Express to deliver a giddyingly lavish tour de force.

The computer effects are a wonder - Marley's wispy spirit is genuinely spinechilling while the snow-dusted streets of Victorian London are exquisitely rendered. The characters cleverly reflect the actors playing them and the decision to stick with English accents is a wise one.

Sometimes the richness of the visual banquet threatens to leave viewers with Christmas afternoon indigestion yet never stops you feeling hungry for more.

Tim Evans