Plot
In Depression-era Concord, New Hampshire, a miserly businessman named Benedict Slade receives a long-overdue attitude adjustment one Christmas Eve when he is visited by three ghostly figures who resemble three of the people whose possessions Slade had seized to collect on unpaid loans. Assuming the roles of the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future from Charles Dickens' classic story, the three apparitions force Slade to face the consequences of his skinflint ways, and he becomes a caring, generous, and more amiable man.
Benedict Slade is a cold-hearted employer of a repossession company who brings misery to everyone who knows him. He had once been in partnership with a similarly cold-hearted man named Jack Latham, who died prior to the film. On Christmas Eve of 1933, Thatcher, Slade's clerk, and his other employees assist him on confiscating the possessions of debtors who cannot repay him. That evening, when Thatcher refuses to help Slade to tear apart some leather-bound books that he confiscated from one of his debtors, Slade thinks that Thatcher "disagrees with everything he does... conspires with others to pull money out of him..." and fires Thatcher, much to his family's dismay. That evening, the power in Slade's warehouse goes out, and some of the repossessed items in the warehouse start making noise of their own accord. When Slade looks through the warehouse to investigate, he is haunted by the spirit of Jack Latham, who tells him to expect three ghosts, who will try to help Slade to change his ways and prevent him from suffering the same fate as that of Latham: being forced to re-live wrongdoings that were made in life but never put right.
That night, Slade is visited by one of his debtors named Merrivale (the first ghost), who shows Slade many events from his past, including his apprenticeship in woodwork with a man named Mr. Brewster, and meeting his now-ex-girlfriend Helen, who had cut ties with him upon learning that although he claimed to have loved her, he had chosen money over her one too many times. Merrivale and Slade's last stops include the younger Slade meeting Latham, and Mr. Brewster's funeral.
Slade awakes in his chambers, but hears choral music coming from his warehouse. He enters it to investigate what is happening, where he meets Jessup (the second ghost), another of his debtors who works in the county orphanage, who is accompanied by a large crowd of carol-singing children. Jessup shows Slade visions of the current Christmas, including the festivities of Helen, who is now happily married and has a daughter, and Thatcher's family, who are saddened by the event of Thatcher losing his job. Slade notices that Thatcher's son, Jonathan, is disabled, using crutches to get around. Jessup warns Slade that Jonathan will die if the future remains unchanged.
Slade awakens back in his chambers, where he is visited by another of his debtors named Matt Reeves (the third ghost). Reeves takes Slade to a possible future Christmas, where Jonathan, Thatcher's son, dies and the Thatchers mourn his passing. Slade's own belongings are then sold in an auction and then burned outside his house following his future death, which is celebrated by the townsfolk. Slade promises to change if he is allowed to have a chance to change, which he is.
Awakening in his chambers on Christmas Day, Slade returns all the repossessed items back to the debtors he took them from, who include Merrivale, Jessup and Reeves - who had appeared to Slade as the three ghosts. When visiting Jessup's orphanage, Slade finds a bitter orphan like he himself was, and adopts the orphan as his ward and apprentice.
Academy Award-winning special make-up effects artist Rick Baker consulted on the aging makeup for star Henry Winkler.[2]
