The newest tackle Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” comes from filmmaker Ti West, who’s finest recognized for grotesque tales like “Home of the Satan, “Pearl,” and “The Sacrament.” So, it is maybe to be anticipated that the primary trailer for “Ebenezer” feels very horror-tinged — from the spectral determine of the Ghost of Christmas Previous (Andrea Riseborough) to the blood-red textual content reminding us of star Johnny Depp’s earlier “misfit” characters.
Ebenezer Scrooge is Depp’s first main mainstream function in fairly just a few years. The actor’s profession was already beginning to fizzle within the mid-2010s with a string of field workplace bombs, from “Darkish Shadows” to “Alice By the Wanting Glass.” Then, a extremely publicized sequence of ugly authorized battles between Depp and his ex-wife Amber Heard made him largely untouchable for years so far as Hollywood was involved.
However late final 12 months, Paramount Photos introduced that “Ebenezer: A Christmas Carol” was in improvement for a Thanksgiving 2026 launch, with Depp taking heart stage. The film has had a fairly speedy turnaround, with principal images solely kicking off in January of this 12 months. Now, Paramount has unveiled the primary trailer as a part of a promotional push at San Diego Comedian-Con 2026. Test it out above.
The Ebenezer trailer includes a basic horror homage
Among the many broader horror motifs within the “Ebenezer” trailer is a direct homage to Johnny Depp’s very first film function, in Wes Craven’s 1984 basic “A Nightmare on Elm Road.” In one of many film’s most memorable scenes, Depp’s character will get pulled inside his mattress by Freddy Krueger’s razor claws, and an excellent torrent of blood spews from the opening that he was pulled into. “Ebenezer” has a significantly milder model of this in a clip the place Scrooge sinks into his mattress — presumably as a part of his journey into the Christmases of the previous, current, and future.
Although the tagline guarantees “The title you understand … the story you do not,” the moments clipped within the “Ebenezer” trailer are all fairly acquainted beats from Charles Dickens’ authentic novel, which has been tailored many occasions through the years. (The definitive adaptation for a lot of continues to be 1992’s “The Muppet Christmas Carol.”) It is attainable, although, that screenwriter Nathaniel Halpern added just a few surprises to this newest model of the story.
The solid of “Ebenezer” additionally contains Ian McKellen as Scrooge’s late accomplice, Jacob Marley, Rupert Grint as Scrooge’s put-upon worker, Bob Cratchit, and “Severance” breakout Tramell Tillman because the Ghost of Christmas Current.
“Ebenezer” arrives in theaters on November 13, 2026.
