The Adventures of Tintin
Very fast and action-packed, this movie makes your head spin due to non-stop action and 3D.
This is the second 3D movie I’ve seen this week, that actually works. Steven Spielberg is trying to make a massive comeback after Indiana Jones 4 fiasco by releasing 2 movies in one week, so of course I had to see one of them. Being a huge Spielberg fan I was really disappointed by the choice of topic he decided to work on. And it took some self-convincing to force myself into the theater actually – on one hand there’s a story of World War I through the eyes of a horse (!) and on the other is 3D motion capture version of “famous” Belgian cartoon. But after an initial dilemma the idea of “The Adventures of Tintin” looked like more sane than that of “War Horse“.
Essentially I had no idea about back story of Tintin and Co., and I’m sure 99% of my readers don’t know either, so here’s a short version of the plot. Movie follows young (teenage? adult? I have no idea, he looks babyface like DiCaprio) journalist Tintin and his loyal friend – dog named Snowy (who actually is smarter than everyone in the movie), as they discover an ancient ship model of a famous 17th century ship “Unicorn”, that according to the legend was sunk with “secret cargo” aboard. Out of the blue, this replica model gets into hands of Tintin and, like everyone was waiting for just this magic moment, an epic adventure including pirates, ancient treasures, puzzles, drunken escapades, crazy voyages etc. unfolds in alarmingly fast manner.
All this is done with the same precision and orientation as Indiana Jones movies. Well, at least it was intended that way. I don’t know how to interpret the acting, since its 100% animation. So I’m just going to comment on the animation and directing part.
Movie is 100% adventure, and in my opinion it pushes the boundary some times. I consider the best adventure movie to be first Indiana Jones (“Raiders of the Lost Ark“), and even there Spielberg used overlapping FAST-SLOW-FAST formula, which in return gave the viewer the chance to take a breathe from long action sequences and immerse into incredible puzzles. In “Tintin” the slow part was very small and the fast action part occupied much bigger section of the movie. I assume leaving the movie for the restroom break and coming back 2 minutes later, you wouldn’t be able to understand WHY, WHAT and WHERE is going on.
That being said, the movie is one great rollercoaster. 3D animation is on top, sometimes you can even confuse it with live action sequences, and the only thing that keeps you from falling for it is cartoonish characters. Very nice usage of 3D projection techniques actually makes “The Adventures of Tintin” the best one since “Avatar”. Although I would recommend to watch it carefully, I experienced some teary eyes due to concentration on 3D glasses like I never had before.
Overall I enjoyed it. I really wish there was something more to it, I kind of felt dissatisfied by the ending. So I’m giving 7 out of 10. Definitely a good movie to watch.
