The Adventures of Tintin (2011)

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Overview

The Adventures of Tintin is a 3-D animated motion capture film based on The Adventures of Tintin comic strips created by Hergé. The film is directed by Steven Spielberg and produced by Peter Jackson and written by Steven Moffat, Edgar Wright, and Joe Cornish. Starring Jamie Bell as the intrepid young journalist Tintin and Andy Serkis as Captain Haddock as they set off on a treasure hunt for a ship one of Haddock's ancestors once commanded but along the way they find someone else is searching for the treasure as well.

Creation

The Secret of The Unicorn book

Steven Spielberg originally acquired the film rights to Tintin in 1983 after Hergé's death and re-optioned the rights in 2002. He originally became a fan of the series after reading a review for Raiders of The Lost Ark in 1981 when a reviewer compared the film to Tintin. He had his secretary find him copies of the stories and although he did not speak French he still fell in love with the books. Hergé himself was unsatisfied with the previous adaptations of the characters and became a fan of Spielberg's work. Author of Tintin: The Complete Collection Michael Farr said that Hergé felt that Spielberg "was the only one person who could ever do Tintin justice". When in London for filming of Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom with his production partner Kathleen Kennedy, Spielberg set up a metting with Hergé during the week he was there but unfortunately he died that week but his widow still gave them the rights. The deal was finalized in 1984 with Universal being the distributor though no development on the project came to fruition until the 2000's.

The film was primarily based on three Tintin stories: The Crab With The Golden Claws, The Secret of The Unicorn, and Red Rackham's Treasure. Peter Jackson himself had always been an avid fan of the comics and suggested that the film be made via motion capture, a technology he had used previously in Lord of The Rings trilogy and in King Kong. He felt that a totally Live-Action film would not do justice to the character at all.

Plot Summary

Tintin, a young intrepid journalist along with his dog Snowy buy a cheap model of a ship, the Unicorn at a flea market in Belgium when he is confronted by Ivan Ivanovitch Sakharine and the mysterious Barnaby who offer to buy the model from Tintin. He does not sell them the model though and takes it home with him but when Snowy gets into a fight with the neighbors cat, it is broken. A parchment scroll then slips out from one of the masts and Snowy sees it but is unable to alert Tintin about it. Meanwhile the bungling twin detectives Thompson and Thomson are after a pickpocket, Aristides Silk. At Marlinspike Hall, Tintin meets Sakharine and learns there are at least two model ships in total. Tintin is later shot and then kidnapped and brought aboard the SS Karaboudjan. Tintin escapes though and meets the ship's captain, Captain Haddock.

Haddock however is of no use to Tintin as the First Mate gave him whiskey which Haddock drank and inebriated himself. Tintin, Haddock, and Snowy though escape the ship with the aid of a lifeboat. Sakharine sends one of his henchmen in a seaplane to find them but the plane is captured by Tintin and he flies it towards to the Moroccan port city of Bagghar but never makes it as the plane crashes into the desert instead. Haddock then begins to hallucinate due to dehydration and the heat of the desert about one of his ancestors who was Captain of the Unicorn in the 17th Century.

The Legendary Unicorn

Sir Francis Haddock's ship was attacked by the feared pirate Red Rackham and after a brief but violent struggle Sir Francis surrendered and rather than let the treasure fall into the hands of Red Rackham, he chose to sink the ship and all it's many treasures. It is then revealed that three models of the Unicorn were made. Each contains a scroll and when all three are put together, they will reveal the location of the ship and its' treasures. While in Bagghar, Tintin and the Captain discover the location of the third model. They find it's in the possession of an Arab merchant named Omar Ben Salaad and he has it encased in a bullet proof glass display case.

Sakharine plans to steal the ship by setting up a concert where diva Bianca Castafiore will sing and with her voice the case will shatter. His trained Hawk would scoop down and steal the scroll for him. Sakharine steals the scroll and is chased down to the harbor by Tintin and the Captain and successfully escapes with all three scrolls. Tintin though doesn't give up and chases him back to Europe where the police await Sakharine. Sakharine is revealed to be the descendant of Red Rackham replays his ancestor's swordfight with Sir Francis with Captain Haddock with the dock's cranes and unlike his ancestor, Captain Haddock is victorious and defeats Sakharine. Tintin and Haddock use the scrolls to find the map which reveals that Marlinspike Hall is the location of the treasure. Sir Francis Haddock was the original builder of the hall and in the cellar is where he hid some of the treasure and a clue to the location of the sunken Unicorn.

Production

Production was originally set to begin in October 2008 for a release in 2010 but ended being pushed back one year to a release in 2011 and production was set to begin in 2009. Filming began on January 26, 2009 and the release date moved from 2010 to 2011. Peter Jackson was on set for the first week of filming and supervised the rest of filming through video-conferencing. During the Principal Photography many famous directors like Guillermo Del Toro, David Fincher, Robert Zemeckis, and James Cameron were all present on set during filming at various times. Peter Jackson supervised the visual effects on the work on the film as his company Weta Digital was in charge of the effects used to create the whole look of the film but Spielberg was not present and supervised it via video-conferencing.

Reception

Released in Europe first on October 24, 2011, Tintin received mainly positive reviews from critics and from audiences. On review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a 76% approval rate from critics out of 146 reviews. The consensus was that "Drawing deep from the classic Raiders of the Lost Ark playbook, Steven Spielberg has crafted another spirited, thrilling adventure in the form of Tintin." Some critics though like Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly weren't as thrilled by the film. In his review he stated "I've barely even glanced at a Tintin comic, and what I saw looked more like The Adventures of Rubber Boy and Captain Boring". He also stated the film had a "kiddie Indiana Jones aesthetic" even though Tintin predates Indiana Jones by about fifty years. The most praise went to the film's animation which was provided by Peter Jackson's Weta Digital. Financially, the film proved to be a massive success worldwide but domestically in the US the film did not perform nearly as well.

Marketing

To cash in on the film a video game based on the film was developed by Ubisoft Entertainment. Like most movie tie in games, The Adventures of Tintin received mainly negative reviews and received a 6/10 from Eurogamer. The gameplay is a hybrid of 3D platforming and 2D sidescrolling.The game has three modes, "Tintin and Haddock, Campaign, and Challenges". The single player campaign was heavily criticized but much praise was given to the game's co-op mode in which the players can play as Tintin and Captain Haddock who is unavailable for play in the campaign. Screened's sister site Giant Bomb did a Quick Look on it on December 7, 2011. Both Brad Shoemaker and Vinny Caravella enjoyed the game's co-op mode like many other reviewers.

Music

Longtime collaborator of Spielberg's and five time Academy Award winning composer John Williams was brought in to compose the music score for the film. He composed a total of 18 tracks for the film. It has not been said whether or not he will score the sequels though. He is currently composing the score for two upcoming Spielberg films, War Horse in 2011 and Lincoln in 2012. In total, 18 tracks were composed for the film.