Scrooged 4K UHD Review: Christmas 4Karol

This year marks the 35th anniversary of Scrooged, the ‘80s update of A Christmas Carol. While it still feels like yesterday I saw this in theaters and watched it over and over on VHS, at least the big anniversary brings us a new 4K UHD with a Christmas gift of extras.

Scrooged offers a look at ‘80s New York (or Canada sometimes). At night especially with Christmas lights the pure black sky in 4K is stunning. You see three Christmas eves, past present and future. Actually more because he goes to 1955, 1968, 1969 and 1971 in the past.

4K lighting also enhances the ghostly aura of the Christmas Carol. Frank Cross (Bill Murray)’s boardrooms are full of black pockets behind him. The soundstage where he is producing Scrooge also highlights the stage lighting directing the eye to specific areas of the frame.

When the Ghost of Christmas Present (Carol Kane) first appears, her knockdown, dragon brawl with Frank begins in a black void of bubbles.

Home video releases have enhanced the soundtrack of Scrooged for surround, though they don’t overdo it. You’ll hear the chaos of The Night the Reindeer Died, John Forsythe’s explosive entrance, the production antics on the Scrooge stage, Elliot (Bobcat Goldthwait) shooting up the office and the elevator to the future in the rears.

The extras produced for the never released 2006 DVD are finally presented, still in standard definition. There’s nothing controversial here, but it’s full of behind-the-scenes footage and then-new interviews looking back at the film. They’re nice throwbacks to an age where just getting the gang back together to talk was a true bonus, and Dick Donner was still with us.

In particular, two archival on set pieces show Murray improvising and working out scenes with Donner. The Showest promotes are Murray on fire, especially the message to theater ushers.

Donner begins his commentary explaining how the title was supposed to appear in dialogue, and calls out the political right who prevented it. He also rips his Lethal Weapon producer Joel Silver. If you’ve heard Donner commentaries before, you know he spends a lot of time watching the movie, but when he chimes in he’s genial and funny.