The suspense that really hangs over “Ebenezer” is not how the nth retelling of the ghostly Dickens classic “A Christmas Carol” is interpreted, but whether or not this will rubber stamp the comeback of Johnny Depp. It is a sensible vehicle for that mission. For the once-defamed star whose career has been almost singularly associated with the showmanship of gothic and garish personae, playing Ebenezer Scrooge, among the most enduring icons of the holiday season, is about as close as you can get to low-stakes, foolproof-branded IP.
Time will tell if the box office — and therefore, the studios and the public — has reaccepted Depp. But as for the artistry itself, this is a film that feels like the mini-comeback before the comeback; at his worst, Depp appears as if he is in a Scrooge costume in a Christmas-season ad campaign for Verizon. At his best, he is competent.
The latter is fine enough for an adaptation, directed by Ti West, that, among the many iterations of the Dickens tale, toggles mostly between dual modes of the perfunctory and the inoffensive. This is a “Christmas Carol” iteration that is bland in imagination and supremely straightforward in interpretation.
It follows the story structure we’ve all known since elementary school: The greedy miser known as Scrooge is visited by the ghost of his colleague, Jacob Marley, then by three more apparitions on Christmas Eve, each haunting him out of his avarice and into the holiday spirit. It injects little beyond some studio scale, and gives its supporting cast, including Ian McKellen, Tramell Tillman and Daisy Ridley, little room to play.
But this is the Ebenezer show, which is to say the one orbiting around Depp, who relies mostly on an exaggerated scowl and a spunky grouchiness to steer an adaptation single-mindedly focused on four-quadrant holiday levity and predictability. (The film, which might be the first post-merger Paramount project to feature the Skydance name in its title card, may also prove to be a telling symbol, or omen, of the studio’s future direction.)
Seeing Depp, on billboards as much as on the screen itself, induces déjà vu, which just might be the point. He is not creating an interpretation of, or even really playing, Ebenezer Scrooge — fundamentally this is a ploy to put Depp in a get-up again, and specifically one whose general figure and humbug coziness we all have stored in the recesses of our childhood minds.
It’s an attempt to, as much as one can in one role, play the hits. Whether consciously or simply out of a lack of creativity, the aging star is playing an agreeable version of himself, more than anything, aimed at providing a fond reminder of the Depp-in-drag iconography he crafted for himself over the last few decades.
What this all means is in fact a dubious magic act geared toward something more corrective beyond a comeback. In all the ignominy of his last few years, it’s easy to forget that Depp did not tumble from the top as a result of a courtroom battle; his acting career had already hardened into a shtick for years. “Ebenezer” implicitly markets itself on the empirically shaky idea of a beloved Depp that was taken away. If you don’t squint too hard, his Scrooge might not only function as a return, but a memory wipe.
Ebenezer Rated PG-13 for frightening material. Running time: 1 hour 56 minutes. In theaters.
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