The director takes full advantage of the elastic reality afforded by the semi-animated medium to pull off some incredible sequences he could never have accomplished in live action. That technology has come along way from the creepy dead eyed characters in the first motion capture movies and while the animation doesn’t quite have the detail or artistry of a Pixar movie, it’s starting to come damn close.
To bring the cartoony comic book series to life, Spielberg employed the motion capture technology that his buddy Robert Zemeckis developed in titles like The Polar Express and the deeply underrated Beowulf. The filmmaker essentially tells the story through set pieces, with barely any scene passing without some sort of chase, fight, explosion, or a flashback to all three. They’re merely a vehicle for grand Spielberg suspense and action sequences and the great director has some incredible ones up his sleeve. The specifics of the plot aren’t important. Along the way, he meets up with a few series regular characters in the semi-competent twin Interpol offices Thompson and Thomson as well as the drunken Captain Haddock, all of whom will return in the inevitable sequels. In retaliation, he sets out to retrieve the boat and ends up caught in the midst of an international adventure for lost treasure. Tintin refuses and his apartment is swiftly broken into and the model ship stolen. Tintin discovers a model ship in a market and buys it only to instantly be asked to sell it by a mysteriously evil man (Ivanovich Sakharine, a name with so many syllables that the character has to be evil). It’s impossible to tell and that was always the style of original author Herge’s whimsical comic book world. The film introduces the titular hero and his canine companion on the streets of Paris with an amusing in-joke to good to spoil here. The only problem is that the film is so fast and action packed it can become exhausting…if you even consider that a problem. This is a welcome return of thrill ride Spielberg that almost makes up for that whole Crystal Skull debacle.
Who), Edgar Wright (Shaun Of The Dead), and Joe Cornish (Attack The Block), the film is a ripping boy’s own adventure that kicks off the first action scene barely 10-minutes in and then jumps from set piece to set piece from that point on.
Surrounded by a team of non-America Tintin enthusiasts in producer Peter Jackson (Lord Of The Rings) as well as screenwriters Steven Moffat (Dr. It’s not surprising that the source material captured the imagination of the 80s populist Spielberg, because the final film is possibly the most unrelentingly entertaining movie that he’s made since that decade.