review by Andrew James Pro
The Adventures of Tintin 2011
Reviewed Feb 06, 2012
Andrew James’s review:
Incredibly boring with unflattering characters and attempts at comedy that had me eye rolling ever bit as much as I was checking my watch. No stakes, no story, no intrigue. Just a series of set pieces that, for the most part, linger on nothing of interest.
The character of Tin Tin himself is as bland as he appears. Wish I would've skipped this one.
Have no interest in seeing this as Tin Tin is indeed bland. In Europe Tin Tin was always marketed alongside Asterix, and you tended to be in one camp or the other. The kids with hateful parents who made them learn French age 3 read Tin Tin, the cool kids read Asterix (with a druid called Getafix, whats not to like). Thanks for confirming what I already knew.
I had no idea till this weekend Jamie Bell was the same kid from Billy Elliot.
I think that's the first film I ever saw him in. He's underseen but overrated in my opinion. I still use him as ammo when trying to defend Jumper though. :)
"The kids with hateful parents who made them learn French age 3 read Tin Tin, the cool kids read Asterix (with a druid called Getafix, whats not to like). "
Heh. My kids are learning French from Kindergarten and my son adores both the TINTIN and ASTERIX books. We enjoyed the movie quite a bit, but I'd agree that it's no classic...
Dont worry Kurt, I was relaying my experiences from the late 70's, though my son does love Asterix, he doesn't know who Tin Tin is. You need to know French in Canada for those pesky DVD covers surely..........
I have no interest what-so-ever in this, and has had the same feeling about the trailers as you feel about the movie - bland and uninteresting. Sounds like it's one movie I'll skip for sure.
I remember watching the cartoons as a kid and always found Tintin boring, wanting it to be done so I could watch some Lucky Luke.
I loved Tintin, it has to be said. I thought it was great fun - it flew by for me. And I was a fan of Tintin and Asterix as a kid :)
I'll stand with David - I loved it too. And I have no familiarity with the comics whatsoever. It's also the first time ever a 3D movie didn't give me a headache. (Though that's not the only reason I liked it.)
Ditto, Jandy, this was the first 3D film in a long while (albeit I don't see many of 'em) that didn't give me a mindsplitting migraine.
Is it weird to say what I wished the film were 'slower' or at least 30 minutes longer to settle into some of the locales?
Otherwise, TINTIN is a great 'minor work' from Spielberg.
I think 3D not giving you a headache is not really praise. It's like saying, "well I didn't throw up this time, so the chicken must be good."
The attempts at humor in this movie are so so sad. If you found anything in this movie humorous I probably don't know you. The more I think about this movie the angrier I get. Not because it is terrible, but because it is so less than bland. It really felt like a waste of 100 minutes of my life.
It's not that I praise the film on the quality of its 3D, only that its 3D becomes invisible very quickly over the course in the film . (I won't go into why then, that the 3D is totally redundant if you are not going to notice it, or it is not going to improve the film). I guess what I'm trying to say is that I was stuck seeing this in that garish format, and STILL came out enjoying the film a lot, which says something.
And c'mon. Captain Haddock's BLISTERING BARNACLES is endearing, at least.
Yeah, that's why I said that's not the only reason I liked it. The fact that I enjoyed the 3D as well is just an additional point in its favor.
I guess I didn't see the movie as primarily a comedy, though I did find things funny in it. Maybe not laugh out loud funny, but gently cute. Like Snowy stumbling across the empty bottles - and how often do kids movies have drunkenness as a lightly-treated plot point? But really, it was the adventure film feel that I liked a lot - it was like watching a 1930s serial, with all the breathless naivete that goes along with that.
My thoughts exactly Jandy.
I am in the camp of "loved it" as well. There were some fun action pieces throughout and that tracking long shot as Tintin goes after the map piece was really fun to watch. The film isn't groundbreaking or anything like that, but that wasn't the aim. And I would say the humor was geared more toward silly than laugh-out-loud. I found myself more amused than anything else, which was my reaction to the humor in the books as well.
And what Jandy, David and Kurt have said. :)
Your review sums it up perfectly, Andrew!
I disagree. I found the characters perfectly phased and downright fun, and just as I remember Tintin from my childhood. The cartoon is "conservative" at best, and it's a wonder he's "still alive". But the film respected the source material, I think. The story was like a moulded classic. Predictable but engaging. I love the motion capture technique, it serves the film perfectly.