Bordering on “horrifying” according to CNN’s reviewer.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/Movies/11/10/review.polar.express/index.html
That was certainly my impression from the trailers. It’s the eyes – they look dead. The Final Fantasy movie was much better in that regard.
Hahaha the reviewer really didn’t like the film, he brought up Bosom Buddies.
Saw it last night and loved every minute of it. An instant X-mas classic in my book.
I have to admit I’m pretty skeptical about this. I saw a making of special and they had some behind the scenes footage of Hanks acting with the motion capture stuff (it’s the scene where he leans down to the boy and points off in the other direction in the preview). Anyway, it was really sad to watch Hanks give a really nice take, lots of expression around the eyes, then to watch the “finished footage” and see the most lifeless piece of modelling I’ve seen in a while fail to capture Hanks’ performance. even the movements were so stiff, I felt like I was watching a cutscene from X2 The Threat.
Hey, if he keeps hiring Scolari it’s hard to avoid it.
And this movie cost like 190 million to make.
Interestingly, Roger Ebert also says it is creepy, “but in that sneaky, teasing way that lets you know eerie things could happen.”
Van Allsburg is a pretty creepy dude. Most of his books have a bit of disturbing undertone to them, and I feel like the preview, at least, captured his visual style fairly well.
Well, there’s “story creepy” and “we slipped trying to come up the right side of the uncanny valley” creepy.
Actually, his books tend to be a bit creepy visually as well (which is partly why I like them). Van Allsburg has a sort of surreal twist to his work; he reminds me a bit of Giorgio de Chirico sometimes (thematically, if not stylistically). Check out The Mysteries of Harris Burdick or The Widow’s Broom or the Garden of Abdul Gasazi (or Jumanji, for that matter) for prime examples.
The Polar Express, OTOH, is very much the most un-creepy book he has ever done.
The clip shown during Gilmore Girls last night looked asstastic. I don’t know why they did it in CG. When I first heard about it I thought it could have been done as a cool, magical little live action film. But instead there a dozen waiters singing and dancing about hot chocolate while Tom Hanks’ conductor does his best Shatner-esque spoken word part.
They also could have tried to animate it in a more traditional manner, and tried to capture the style of the wonderful pastel work in the book. As it stands, the CG clips that I’ve seen of the movie look far less impressive than the illustrations on which they are based.
Allsburg refused to license the product for an animated feature.
And on its opening day:
The Polar Express: $2,568,233
The Incredibles: $4,510,094
Not good considering they are very close in theater counts and TV has been wall to wall PE ads
Did Polar Express open on a weekend?
I’ve heard nothing but good things about it. I know someone who saw it yesterday, then turned around and went to see the Imax version a few hours later.
Did Polar Express open on a weekend?
I’ve heard nothing but good things about it. I know someone who saw it yesterday, then turned around and went to see the Imax version a few hours later.[/quote]
You’d think an adaption of a much love children’s book would manage to beat a movie a week old on its opening day?
Ironically, most members of the opening day audience were Tom Hanks.
No, on a wednesday. You can see the daily breakdown here.
Personally, I can see why it would have a slow start. It’s still only mid-November, and the rush to see holiday movies hasn’t quite set in for many of us.
For me, the commercials and even trailers, did nothing to make me want to see the movie. Even disregarding the fact that I’ve been avoiding newer “holiday movies” for a while, the trailers I’ve seen so far just feel like too much like another hokey “boy who does not BELIEVE learns to FEEL Christmas again!!!” plot. The actual story could be completely different, but that’s the vibe some of the commercials put out.
Also, looking at trailers for Incredibles versus Polar Express, the former just looks more “fun” and “alive” than the latter. Hell, even the stylized cartoon character designs of the Incredibles seem more “real” in motion than the motion-captured figures of Polar Express.
So I can see why right now there’s not a huge push to go see Polar Express, but that will change the closer we get to the real holidays.
My wife has wanted to see this since she saw the trailer months ago, literaly squealing with joy in a packed, silent theatre when she realized what it was halfway through the trailier.
I’m seeing it this Saturday night, but from what I’ve seen in all the trailers and stills, is that it captures the look and feel of the book very well, it just looks scary when you animate the still pictures that still look like they are frozen in time, or dead in the eyes. We’ll see.