Carol for Another Christmas, on ABC
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Caution: spoilers.

This first aired in 1964 (eleven years before I was born), but I didn't see it until 2025. It was written by Rod Serling, of The Twilight Zone fame. I'm listing it under "holiday TV movies" because it is set on Christmas Eve, even though that seems rather incidental, more so than is usually the case with "A Christmas Carol" adaptations. But I don't really know what other category of TV movies I could list it under, so whatever. Anyway, I didn't think it was particularly good for entertainment value, compared to other versions of the story, but it is quite good as far as being a "message" movie. It's just deeply depressing that it's just as relevant in 2025 as it ever was.

The main character is a rich industrialist named Daniel Grudge. Unlike Ebenezer Scrooge, he doesn't seem to particularly hate Christmas, though it does serve as a painful reminder of his son Marley's death in war, on a previous Christmas Eve. His nephew, Fred, shows up to talk to him about the influence Grudge had in getting a cultural exchange program cancelled at the university where Fred is a professor. A teacher from Poland was supposed to come teach at the university, while one of the American teachers was going to go to Poland. Fred is upset that because of his uncle, this is no longer going to happen. They get into an argument about isolationism, as Grudge believes America shouldn't involve itself with other countries in any way, including things like foreign aid, or the United Nations. He also believes in America building up its nuclear arsenal as much as possible.

After Fred leaves, Grudge briefly sees a vision of his late son, though to my surprise, the ghost of Marley never actually speaks to him. But soon after that, Grudge is visited by the Ghost of Christmas Past, and finds himself on a ship carrying coffins containing the dead from all nations, who died in World War I. The ghost suggests that people should spend more time talking to each other, so as to spend less time fighting each other. He also shows Grudge a scene from Grudge's own past as a naval commander during World War II, in which he visited Hiroshima after it had been destroyed by the atom bomb.

Next, Grudge is visited by the Ghost of Christmas Present, who shows him people in an internment camp who are starving, while the ghost himself eats from a banquet. Grudge doesn't want to eat in front of starving people, but the ghost insists it's no different than if he couldn't actually see the starving people. The ghost tells him how many millions of people in the world are suffering various avoidable situations, because of the lack of compassion from people like Grudge.

Finally, the Ghost of Christmas Future shows Grudge the remnants of a building that had once been the town hall in the city where Grudge lives. It had been destroyed in a nuclear conflict that killed most of the world's people, though the ghost won't tell him exactly when that will have happened. A group of survivors enter the building, to be addressed by their leader, the Imperial Me. He calls all the survivors "me's", and basically says that everyone should only look out for themselves. He also urges them to attack other groups of survivors rather than talk with them. One of the survivors, Grudge's butler, Charles, tries to reason with them, but everyone is against him, except for one woman, who we later learn is Grudge's cook, Ruby. (I assumed she was Charles's wife, but really have no idea.) She's obviously distraught by everything that's going on, but says nothing. The people beat Charles, who is then charged with treason. He tries to escape, and the people urge him to kill himself. He is eventually killed by a young boy with a gun. Grudge wants to know if he himself had died before all this happened, but the ghost doesn't answer him. He also doesn't respond when Grudge wants to know if this future is avoidable or not.

The next morning, Grudge wakes up in his own home. Fred shows up, saying Grudge had called him during the night and asked him to stop by. Grudge apologizes to him for the things he said the previous day, and seems more inclined to accept that talking and involvement with other nations may be necessary to prevent future wars. He doesn't seem as radically changed as Scrooge generally does in these stories, but he has at least had his mind opened to new ways of thinking. Anyway... like I said, all this is still quite relevant today. I'm kind of glad I watched the movie this year in particular (I almost watched it last year), because this year the US is becoming more isolationist, more hateful toward "outsiders" like immigrants, and may soon start a pointless war. I feel I haven't done an adequate job explaining all that happens in the movie, or all that is said. So I highly recommend watching it for yourself. I suppose the whole movie would be derided as "woke propaganda" by many Americans, who are even more closed-minded than Grudge, to begin with. But still, the parallels to our present situation are striking. I definitely found the movie powerful, and the message more timely and tangible than that of the original "Christmas Carol".