Hugo - 2011

Martin Scorsese

This one felt quite a bit more like a Spielberg film than anything Scorsese ever made.  Good to see that a director with the depth of Marty can begin to stretch into areas that don’t have guns and Italians.  There was very little bloodshed in this one.

Hugo, like the awards, most likely invites just such an award.  Originality, quality, depth of insight into the characters and backgrounds all check out.  Special Effects?  ILM.  This was a roller-coaster of a ride through many layers of models, maps, and meticulous re-constructions from historical reality in order to bring to light one of the most ingeniously creative and innovative minds of the modern era.  Melies was indeed way ahead of his time, and Mr. Scorsese did more than a bang-up job of creating a work that highlighted that life, without it being a “fictumentary”.  Yes, I am inventing that word as we speak.  So if it becomes a meme, let it be known that this day, Friday December 21st, 2012, I created it!  Hah!

Hugo put me in that kind of mood, in any case.

But how much did Martin have to do with all that SFX and scenery and fantastic falderal?  Well, advisedly I’m sure he stayed on top of it.  But let’s talk about the acting.  That’s what directors do you know.  They direct the actors.  He had an automatic gem here in Sacha Cohen, and not because of his loony roles in his 2 mocumentary satires (mocumentary is NOT a word that I have made up, that was already invented some time ago), and especially in Chloe Grace Moritz, whose effervescence is so unique and mystical she could probably act on screen while sleeping.  But what of Asa Butterfield?  He “looked” the part, certainly, with that urchin chin and grin, and naturally falling loose black hair, the street urchin deluxe.  But what of his work?  

Well, I can’t imagine Marin Scorsese having a hard time with children, even though they say that animals and children are the most difficult.  But for some reason Asa did not carry the part on screen.  It was a dismal failure.  Sorry Asa.  It’s not just looks we’re after here.  He does not have the maturity of Chloe.  Beside her he looked like a high school play actor working on a first run of Les Miserables.  I can imagine in scenes like the activating of the automaton as it begins to write that there were many takes.  He still didn’t get it right.  No matter how he threw those bottles around or how he tramped into the chair and attempted the pouty look, or waited between shots as they squirted fake tears into his eyes as the camera rolled, Martin Scorsese’s eyebrows were probably a bit knit together, and there were a few calls for lunch, and dinner, and….to be continued the next days.  He did a lot more with a lesser name, Christopher Serrone, in Goodfellas, than he got out of young Butterfield.

Well, all in all it was still an effectively good story about the great old film master.  It’s quite possible that there should have been a re-write however in this case, to place more background and emphasis on Melies and less on the little boy in the train station. 

I was never quiet sure how the backstory of the station master tied in with him being either/both cruel then sympathetic with orphans.  Cohen brought the very best action and comedy to the film however, and played his part superbly, even though it was all a necessary side-plot.  Wonderfully done.  The station scenes were completely convincing, and all of that side-plot worth the price of admission.

But for some reason I have found myself almost wishing now that someone would take another crack at Melies from a different direction entirely, exploring the fire, the war, the background of the man who bought the automaton at a museum auction, etc.  Those were all very interesting “side stories” here that did not get the attention that they deserved. 

Artistically this was a magnificent feat, but seeing as how it was not the best work produced by Mr. Scorsese, it must be viewed as a foray into a realm that he is simply not as comfortable with as of yet.  If I viewed this without knowing who directed it, I would have said it was by the director that brought us Percy Jackson, and Harry Potter, which would be Chris Columbus.

[As a side note:  It’s also quite possible that somehow in the politics of things that Sacha Cohen and Ben Kingsley worked out some kind of deal in the background of this one, after that horrible film “The Dictator” (I liken that to “Porky’s a la Politics”), that because Ben Kingsley, the great actor that brought us Gandhi, was forced to play a hideous secondary role in that film, they agreed that this time in Hugo, Mr. Cohen would be the idiot, and Ben the center of attention.]

2.5 stars only, sorry Mr. S, try again please?  Maybe a B/W Italian love story?  Hm