As this sweet year comes to an end; No Nonsense with Nuwan Sen (along with Gingerella & Nudin Sen) would like to wish the Blogging community, a very MERRY CHRISTMAS, for Year 2016!!!
Christmas Query: Which is your favourite Christmas-themed movie?? 
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Late last year, I watched Steven Spielberg’s The Adventures of Tintin (2011), when it premiered on the cable network ‘Star Movies’. I really enjoyed Spielberg’s animated take on Hergé’s Tintin comics, and thought it was a very good adaptation of a classic series of comic books. My personal favourite series of comics, ever since I was kid, that age well and are timeless classics that surpass borders, and that have no age limit. And I re-watched it last night when it was re-telecast on ‘Star Movies’ itself. My original rating remains.
Of course it’s very different to the books, but Steven Spielberg has managed to capture the spirit of the books. The main plot revolves around The Secret of the Unicorn, which blends in a couple of other books too. I re-read The Secret of the Unicorn last year after my original viewing of Spielberg’s The Adventures of Tintin. How different are the book and the movie? For one thing, the main villain of the movie, is just a minor character in the book and neither a villain nor the descendant of the pirate Red Rackham, Ivan Sakharine (both Rackham and Sakharine, voiced by Daniel Craig). And the real villains of the book, the Bird brothers, just have a cameo in the beginning of the movie. Thus the whole story is different to the book, except for the concept that revolves around the sunken ship, The Unicorn, and the treasure buried along with it.
The animation is excellent and would have looked great on 3D. I am not crazy about watching stuff in 3D, not that I dislike it, but it’s not a necessity for me. A good movie should work well, whether it’s on 3D or not. Saying that, I most probably would have watched The Adventures of Tintin on 3D, if I had the chance to do so. What I did not fancy about the animation was that all the people looked robotic. In fact, older, hand drawn, cartoons, made their characters seem more flexible. Tintin and his friends and enemies all seemed like wax models forced to move about, with very stiff turns and very little expressions. The only creature who was the most active, and adorably felt so real, was none other than ‘Snowy’, Tintin’s faithful companion, the ‘common mongrel’, the beloved little white fluff of a dog. The only creature with a pulse, with the exception of Snowy’s own personal arch enemy, the cat.
Spielberg had originally acquired the rights to the movie, from Hergé’s wife in 1983, the same week that Hergé passed away. By the following year Spielberg was ready to start a live action movie with a script about Tintin battling ivory hunters in Africa, and had wanted actor Jack Nicholson to play Haddock. But Spielberg wasn’t that satisfied with the script and returned the rights to the Hergé Foundation. In 2001, Spielberg was interested in depicting Tintin with computer animation, but later reverted to his idea of a live-action adaptation. All this hullabaloo over the Tintin films was going nowhere, and ultimately in 2008, they decided to make this movie that was released in 2011. Even then, due to many a delays, a lot of changes took place, resulting in, actor Thomas Sangster, who was originally cast to voice Tintin, walking out of the project.
Tintin was ultimately voiced by Jamie Bell, Captain Haddock by Andy Serkis and Thomson & Thompson by Nick Frost & Simon Pegg respectively. Snowy, like many a previous adaptations, has no voice. In the sense, we can’t hear what it thinks. All it can do is bark, growl and whine like an ordinary dog.
All in all, this movie is worth checking out by any die hard Tintin fan. Would Hergé have been proud of this adaptation? That’s hard to say, but the movie does capture the essence of Hergé’s classic series of comic books.
A Very Good Movie. 8/10
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