History Film / Scrooge1951

* {{Leitmotif}}: During Scrooge's first scene with Alice, the folk song "Barbara Allen" is playing in the background. When Scrooge goes to Fred's party at the end of the movie, Fred and his friends are all singing the same song, and it continues (presumably non-diegetically) when Scrooge finally meets Fred's wife and accepts that they're actually a great match for each other. The implication is that Scrooge has at last reconnected with the part of himself that is able to have fun with other people, and see value in the idea of romantic love. Apt, for a song about a man who dies of unrequited love.

* BookEnds: At the beginning of the movie, as Scrooge walks down the street, a blind man's dog actually pulls the man away from him, as if [[EvilDetectingDog sensing that he's a bad person]] (this is a MythologyGag straight out of the book). At the end, this time he approaches the man, gives him a little money, and stoops to pet the dog, who happily accepts.

* HeelFaceDoorSlam: By the time Marley finally realizes how wrong his and Scrooge’s actions were, he’s already on his deathbed. All he can do is warn Scrooge that he must change his ways - a warning that, at that moment in time, goes unheeded.

* HeelFaceDoorSlam: By the time Marley finally realizes how wrong his actions were, he’s already on his deathbed. All he can do is warn Scrooge that he must change his ways - a warning that, at that moment in time, goes unheeded.

* HeelFaceDoorSlam: By the time Marley realizes how wrong his actions were, he’s already on his deathbed. All he can do is warn Scrooge that he must change his ways - a warning that, at the time, goes unheeded.

* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: In the original novel the Christmas Past sequence shows that Belle married someone else and had a family, which is the last we see of her. This adaptation shows her counterpart Alice in the Christmas Present, helping feed the poor on Christmas Day, but whether she had a family is unaddressed.

Heading the cast are Creator/AlastairSim as Ebenezer Scrooge and Michael Hordern as Jacob Marley, both of whom would reprise their respective roles for the 1971 animated film ''WesternAnimation/{{A Christmas Carol|1971}}''. Mervyn Johns plays Bob Cratchit, while a young Creator/PatrickMacnee is seen as the younger, living version of Marley.

Clive Donner, who worked as an editor on this film, directed his own version [[Film/AChristmasCarol1984 in 1984]].

''Scrooge'' is a 1951 British film adaptation of Creator/CharlesDickens' ''Literature/AChristmasCarol'', written by Noel Langley (''Film/TheWizardOfOz'') and directed by Brian Desmond Hurst.

[[quoteright:310:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/scrooge_1951_alastair_sim.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:310:Creator/AlastairSim as Scrooge.]]

Heading the cast are Creator/AlastairSim as Ebenezer Scrooge and Michael Hordern as Jacob Marley, both of whom would reprise their respective roles for the 1971 animated film ''WesternAnimation/{{A Christmas Carol|1971}}''. Mervyn Johns plays Bob Cratchit, while a young Creator/PatrickMacnee appears as the younger, living version of Marley.

* BookEnds: At the beginning of the movie, as Scrooge walks down the street, a blind man's dog actually pulls the man away from him, as if [[EvilDetectingDog sensing that he's a bad person]] (this is a MythologyGag straight out of the book). At the end, this time he approaches the man and can be seen giving him a little money.

* StorybookOpening: The film opens with an unseen person's hand pulling ''A Christmas Carol'' from a bookshelf containing several other Dickens works, then opening it to reveal the credits.