David O'ConnellThe Adventures of Tintin
December 8th 2011 03:13
After a three year absence from the director’s chair, Steven Spielberg returns via a new medium: motion-capture animation. With an assist from trusty lieutenant and co-producer Peter Jackson, The Adventures of Tintin will be seen as treading on sacred ground for some. But Spielberg seems to have remained true to Belgian artist Herge’s lavish, much-adored tales of a young reporter and nosy amateur sleuth, Tintin (Jamie Bell), who, with his trusty mutt Snowy nipping at his heels, attempts to solve mysteries.
Purists will view the interweaving of three separate Tintin stories as sacrilegious; a case of tainting the DNA of one with the others. But for those with no prior exposure to these adventure stories, the artistic discretion responsible for this choice will pose no obstacle to enjoyment. And for the most part, that’s what the film delivers: a hyperkinetic, never dawdling thrill-ride that sees Tintin kidnapped when he sticks his nose into the origins of a model replica of sailing ship the Unicorn, which, little does he know, has a secret buried inside it that some bad guys will do anything to get their hands on.
The villain of the piece is Ivan Sakharine (Daniel Craig) who, with his grim delivery and massive dome, physically resembles a cross between Vincent Price and a bearded Thunderbird. Tintin’s unwilling accomplice as he flees the ship Sakharine has commandeered is the vessel’s drunken Scottish captain, Haddock (Andy Serkis), who is also the descendant of the Unicorn’s original captain.
There’s a propulsive energy to the film that translates into an unrelenting cacophony of noise and motion. By the final act, with foreign lands aplenty traversed, it all begins to grate a little, assuming the generic feel of dozens of Hollywood action films, except in animated form. The laws of physics are blatantly, though forgivably disregarded, though the audaciously exacting choreography of the action scenes and spritely attack on the material somehow knocks it into shape, albeit in the most commercial way. The screenplay, shared between a trip of talented writers in their own right – Joe Cornish, Stephen Moffat and Edgar Wright - provides plenty of genuinely funny one-liners though these do seem to be front-loaded, meaning the final act assumes a mechanical inevitability.
John Williams is asked to tag along with a whip-smart baton, his music hitting every note and forced to change direction with ridiculous regularity. But from the playful opening credits cue it’s clear the legendary composer’s instincts have lost none of their edge in his own semi-retirement; the dazzling virtuosity of his music is something the majority of today’s sonic-wallpaper producing composers could only dream of possessing.
Utilising 3D in an integrative manner but never to the point of distraction, The Adventures of Tintin (2011) is superior popular entertainment. It’s a pity the outlandish over-the-top action sequences, each attempting to raise the bar higher as the story kicks further into gear, couldn’t have been dialled down a little. But restraint is hardly the point when the hearts, minds and dollars of the masses are at stake. And anyway, it's the gargantuan sensory overload and thrill ride that most in the audience seek, and from them there can be no complaints.
The Adventures of Tintin opens in Australian cinemas on December 26.
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