Tintin has never seemed so badass
So through some strange confluence of events I found out today that the live-action Tintin movie is actually in post-production and should be in theatres in the next two years or so. Now, I'm a fan of the original series, but not a diehard one. And Spielberg, who's attached to direct, hasn't really impressed me as of late (let's be honest: Indy 4 was not a good movie). In other words, I wasn't particularly jazzed way back when I heard they were making this. But then today I found out that there are actually a ton of reasons to be excited about the movie:
1. Simon Pegg and Nick Frost will be in it. Anyone who knows me knows that my love for these two knows no bounds. And they're playing Thompson and Thompson, which means they don't even have to bother to be serious--they can just be their usual funny, awesome selves.
2. Peter Jackson is intimately involved in the project. From what I gather, he's basically a producer/director. And considering he's yet to make a single misstep in his career (I'm even looking forward to his take on The Lovely Bones), he should help to even out the serious flaws which have afflicted Spielberg's latest offerings.
3. Weta has signed on to do the effects. All you need to do is glance at Weta's resume to understand why this is awesome. Hell, in the last few years they did District 9, Day the Earth Stood Still (shit movie with excellent effects), Narnia (ditto), 30 Days of Night, X-Men and King Kong. They're even working on Cameron's upcoming Avatar, which critics are hailing as the Second Coming. I'm reserving judgment, but the released footage does look pretty impressive.
4. The rest of the cast sounds pretty goddam awesome, with Jamie Bell as Tintin, Andy Serkis as Captain Haddock and Daniel Craig as...some dude. Plus, Guillermo Del Toro and David Fincher were apparently regulars on set. All that adds up to some serious accretion of talent.
All that being said, I still have some reservations:
1. Spielberg is directing. I think his last great movie was back in 98 with Saving Private Ryan--and I don't even like war movies. His movies since then have ranged from empty fare like Catch Me If You Can and The Terminal, to big-budget thinly-plotted action pieces like War of the Worlds, Minority Report and Indy 4. AI was bloated and overly sentimental (criticisms which could also apply to the above movies minus Minority Report), while Munich was plodding and ultimately unfulfilling. Munich wasn't a bad movie, per se, but in relation to some of Spielberg's earlier offerings it fell pretty flat.
2. Snowy is all digital. Now, this one could go either way. Given the sheer scope of Snowy's role in the books, it's understandable that a live-action dog would be unable to fulfill the part. And given the recent outings in blending live-acting animal acting with CGI (Cats & Dogs, I'm looking at you), I'm sort of glad they didn't decide on this route. That being said, having such a central character be entirely digital (without even a human actor a la Gollum and King Kong to interact with the other players) runs the risk of breaking the style of the series. But given the competency Weta has displayed with entirely-CG characters in the past, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
3. Weta is doing the digital effects. This is a tricky one, too, because as I mentioned earlier Weta's pedigree is of the highest calibre. Nevertheless, they have some notable stains on that record, including Van Helsing, I Robot, X3, Fantastic Four 2, and Jumper. Others will disagree, but I found the quality of the CGI in those movies to be particularly abysmal, Val Helsing and Jumper in particular. Hopefully, those movies suffered from budgetary concerns (like expensive lead actors or lack of funding to begin with) which won't affect a large-scale Spielberg production without too many big stars in it.
In the end, I'm cautiously optimistic about this one. Tintin was never a huge part of my childhood, tending as I did toward the more "out there" stories instead of the typical "Let's stop these ivory traders from breaking internation sanctions!" yarns. But I can't deny that Spielberg was an eminently competent director at one point in time, and the team he's assembled for this movie sounds fairly competent if not extremely talented. I'm also not going to be up in arms if it turns out to be a flop (like I wanted to be over the recent failure of the Golden Compass movie), but I will say that Spielberg will have to fight the odds to ruin this one because it sounds like it has a lot going for it.
Digression:
Also, just calling it now but Pegg and Frost are the closest thing our generation has to the Abbott and Costello dynamic of yesteryear. I'm not just referring to body types or comic duos, but instead to the fact that these two really seem to have revitalized and re-envisioned the tradition of the double act (the straight man and the funny man, if you will, although the term "funny man" is a little misleading). Then again, the UK seems to have never lost their affinity for such duos, offering up fantastic partnerships like Fry & Laurie and Matt Lucas & David Walliams.
North America, on the other hand, has subverted the genre into the more generic "buddy comedy" wherein two friends play off each other's strengths and shortcomings to comedic effect (see: Cheech & Chong, Hope & Crosby, Spade & Farley, and the two male leads in pretty much any Judd Apatow comedy; there are notable exceptions like Penn & Teller). In North America, the duos function in roles that are less rigidly defined, allowing both actors to function as the straight man or funny man depending on the scene, or even the tone of the movie. Often, the two will appear dissimilar at the start of the movie, but by the end each will learn to embody a quality they lack which the other possesses in abundance, subverting the dynamic even further.
Part of this shift can no doubt be traced to the fact that the relationship is a difficult one to portray on film without seeming contrived. This stems from the misconception that the dynamic relied on traditional structures of "setup-punchline" delivery of jokes, when this is in fact not the case. Much of the comedy in such a dynamic stems from the differing perceptions each man has of the same reality, not from the lines they deliver. Part of the appeal comes from becoming familiar with each man's personality, and knowing ahead of time that certain situations will invariably provoke conflict between the two.
Anyway.
1. Simon Pegg and Nick Frost will be in it. Anyone who knows me knows that my love for these two knows no bounds. And they're playing Thompson and Thompson, which means they don't even have to bother to be serious--they can just be their usual funny, awesome selves.
2. Peter Jackson is intimately involved in the project. From what I gather, he's basically a producer/director. And considering he's yet to make a single misstep in his career (I'm even looking forward to his take on The Lovely Bones), he should help to even out the serious flaws which have afflicted Spielberg's latest offerings.
3. Weta has signed on to do the effects. All you need to do is glance at Weta's resume to understand why this is awesome. Hell, in the last few years they did District 9, Day the Earth Stood Still (shit movie with excellent effects), Narnia (ditto), 30 Days of Night, X-Men and King Kong. They're even working on Cameron's upcoming Avatar, which critics are hailing as the Second Coming. I'm reserving judgment, but the released footage does look pretty impressive.
4. The rest of the cast sounds pretty goddam awesome, with Jamie Bell as Tintin, Andy Serkis as Captain Haddock and Daniel Craig as...some dude. Plus, Guillermo Del Toro and David Fincher were apparently regulars on set. All that adds up to some serious accretion of talent.
All that being said, I still have some reservations:
1. Spielberg is directing. I think his last great movie was back in 98 with Saving Private Ryan--and I don't even like war movies. His movies since then have ranged from empty fare like Catch Me If You Can and The Terminal, to big-budget thinly-plotted action pieces like War of the Worlds, Minority Report and Indy 4. AI was bloated and overly sentimental (criticisms which could also apply to the above movies minus Minority Report), while Munich was plodding and ultimately unfulfilling. Munich wasn't a bad movie, per se, but in relation to some of Spielberg's earlier offerings it fell pretty flat.
2. Snowy is all digital. Now, this one could go either way. Given the sheer scope of Snowy's role in the books, it's understandable that a live-action dog would be unable to fulfill the part. And given the recent outings in blending live-acting animal acting with CGI (Cats & Dogs, I'm looking at you), I'm sort of glad they didn't decide on this route. That being said, having such a central character be entirely digital (without even a human actor a la Gollum and King Kong to interact with the other players) runs the risk of breaking the style of the series. But given the competency Weta has displayed with entirely-CG characters in the past, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
3. Weta is doing the digital effects. This is a tricky one, too, because as I mentioned earlier Weta's pedigree is of the highest calibre. Nevertheless, they have some notable stains on that record, including Van Helsing, I Robot, X3, Fantastic Four 2, and Jumper. Others will disagree, but I found the quality of the CGI in those movies to be particularly abysmal, Val Helsing and Jumper in particular. Hopefully, those movies suffered from budgetary concerns (like expensive lead actors or lack of funding to begin with) which won't affect a large-scale Spielberg production without too many big stars in it.
In the end, I'm cautiously optimistic about this one. Tintin was never a huge part of my childhood, tending as I did toward the more "out there" stories instead of the typical "Let's stop these ivory traders from breaking internation sanctions!" yarns. But I can't deny that Spielberg was an eminently competent director at one point in time, and the team he's assembled for this movie sounds fairly competent if not extremely talented. I'm also not going to be up in arms if it turns out to be a flop (like I wanted to be over the recent failure of the Golden Compass movie), but I will say that Spielberg will have to fight the odds to ruin this one because it sounds like it has a lot going for it.
Digression:
Also, just calling it now but Pegg and Frost are the closest thing our generation has to the Abbott and Costello dynamic of yesteryear. I'm not just referring to body types or comic duos, but instead to the fact that these two really seem to have revitalized and re-envisioned the tradition of the double act (the straight man and the funny man, if you will, although the term "funny man" is a little misleading). Then again, the UK seems to have never lost their affinity for such duos, offering up fantastic partnerships like Fry & Laurie and Matt Lucas & David Walliams.
North America, on the other hand, has subverted the genre into the more generic "buddy comedy" wherein two friends play off each other's strengths and shortcomings to comedic effect (see: Cheech & Chong, Hope & Crosby, Spade & Farley, and the two male leads in pretty much any Judd Apatow comedy; there are notable exceptions like Penn & Teller). In North America, the duos function in roles that are less rigidly defined, allowing both actors to function as the straight man or funny man depending on the scene, or even the tone of the movie. Often, the two will appear dissimilar at the start of the movie, but by the end each will learn to embody a quality they lack which the other possesses in abundance, subverting the dynamic even further.
Part of this shift can no doubt be traced to the fact that the relationship is a difficult one to portray on film without seeming contrived. This stems from the misconception that the dynamic relied on traditional structures of "setup-punchline" delivery of jokes, when this is in fact not the case. Much of the comedy in such a dynamic stems from the differing perceptions each man has of the same reality, not from the lines they deliver. Part of the appeal comes from becoming familiar with each man's personality, and knowing ahead of time that certain situations will invariably provoke conflict between the two.
Anyway.