I remember The Adventures of Tintin more for its comic strips, rather than the old animation and film adaptations, though it's been years since I last saw a panel featuring the adventurous journalist created by Belgian artist Hergé (George Remi). What I do remember about the series, though, is a great sense of adventure. And that Snowy is one smart and awesome dog.
The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn marked the first collaboration between Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson, which in itself is one of the main reasons to watch the film. It also marked Steven Spielberg's first foray into animation, in motion capture format, no less. So, I was pretty much fangirling out ever since I heard about the film.
The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn is actually based on three of the series' comic books, namely The Crab with the Golden Claws, The Secret of the Unicorn and Red Rackham's Treasure.
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Tintin's adventure begins when he purchases a model of a ship called the Unicorn. After refusing succeeding offers made by Barnaby and Ivan Ivanovitch Sakharine, Tintin finds himself intrigued and seeks to learn more about the secrets of the Unicorn. While out to learn more about the Unicorn's history, the model ship is stolen from Tintin's apartment. With the help of Snowy, Tintin finds a cylinder containing a rolled up parchment, which fell from the model ship after an earlier accident. Tintin then follows the clues and a series of unfortunate events occur, including getting his wallet, which contained the riddle, stolen by Aristides Silk, and getting kidnapped by Sakharine's men and taken to the SS Karaboudjan. During his escape attempt, he encounters the drunken Captain Haddock. Together, they try to thwart Sakharine's plans and try to piece together the secret of the Unicorn, a journey which takes them to different parts of the world.
Marvin and I actually watched The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn last December when it was shown in local cinemas. For various reasons, I had to put off writing about it (and about a dozen anime titles) and true to my memory of a fish form, promptly forgot about it until the award show season. I was ranting about how the film wasn't included in the list of nominees for Best Animated Feature at the Oscars, when it had just won in the Golden Globes.
Anyway, despite forgetting to make a timely blog post and being pissed at stuffy Hollywood people, I had no difficulty remembering what I loved about The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn.
I'm no longer certain as to how loyal the film was to the above mentioned source materials, but I loved it. The movie featured a fast paced adventure story, which pitted the young journalist and drunk captain against a villain hell bent on revenge that had lasted generations. The series also showed humor, which was usually exhibited by Captain Haddock, and the bumbling detectives Thomson and Thompson. I particularly liked how Tintin and Haddock's meeting developed into an actual partnership, since it was a central relationship in many of Tintin's comic strip adventures. The film also featured great voice acting by Jamie Bell (Tintin), Andy Serkis (Captain Haddock), Daniel Craig (Sakharine), Nick Frost (Thomson) and Simon Pegg (Thompson).
The film's biggest achievement, though, is in its animation. Considering the advances in the technology that filmmakers employ nowaday, it was a given that they would create detailed backdrops, sweeping scenery and life-like animation. The characters were still familiar, but there were moments when I found myself surprised at how detailed they were rendered, which were evident when close up shots reveal lines on faces and wind ruffling hair strands or fur. The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn was able to successfully take advantage of the motion capture technology, which films like the Polar Express were too early in attempting to do.
Steven Spielberg did well to take notes from Peter Jackson's expertise in motion capture technology, which he developed for The Lord of the Rings and improved on King Kong. Partnering Jackson's input with Spielberg's flair for action sequences created some adrenaline inducing scenes. My favorite scene featuring the combination of the two filmmakers' strengths was the chase through the streets of Bagghar, which was not just exciting because of the action, but also because of the amount of detail involved. My runner up scene would have to be the battle between Sir Francis Haddock and Red Rackham, which involved a battle between ships and their passengers in a stormy sea.
There was a lot of worry over how the film would do in the US, since Tintin is not really a well known character in the States. In fact, this was the reason why the film was screened earlier in Europe and Asia, where the series enjoyed a larger fan base. The potential sequels banked on how the film would do in the box office. In the end (and thank the heavens), the worldwide market prevailed by raking in over $300,000,000 in box office sales for the film. It was enough to get the sequel greenlit for a potential fall 2014 or summer 2015 release.
Which I will wait patiently for, regardless if they eventually decide if Steven Spielberg will direct again or if Peter Jackson will take over the helm for the sequel.
In the meantime, I'm continuously sending my ill intent towards the Oscars for the Best Animated Feature nomination slight.
Happy viewing!!Labels: Action, Adaptation, Adventure, Adventures of Tintin, Animation, Comedy, Film, Motion Capture, Must-Watch
