Friday 30 March 2012

The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn


Finally caught up with this 7 miles above the Atlantic heading West.

I think the first thing to note is the visual impact of the film which through motion capture presents us with an 'animation' that is very close to Hergé's comic book animation style (ligne claire). It is visually very rich and cleverly done.

The plot is very TinTin - a bit like an animated Indiana Jones. However, the film feels as though it's 20 minutes or so too long and at times drifts from one set-piece to another without really advancing the story - rather it just provides another opportunity for some slap-stick capers and another chance for TinTin or Haddock to get captured.

The casting is interesting. Jamie Bell in the lead role turns in a first class performance as do Pegg and Frost as the Thomson twins. Andy Serkis as Haddock sounds more like Ken Bruce from BBC Radio 2 which gave me a really odd transference of personas - although the beard fitted well. Sakharine was played by Daniel Craig but looked like an animated Timothy Dalton which was most odd and a distraction that didn't leave me throughout the film.

The plot is straight-forward and offers little food for analysis as it simply serves as a vehicle for TinTin and his chums to place yet another brigand behind bars. One question we might consider is 'is animated violence more 'acceptable' and what does that mean when the animation originates through motion capture?'. Just a thought.

This is nevertheless a faithful re-presentation of the phenomenon and an enjoyable watch. I'll give it 7/10.

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