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Adventures of Tintin movie poster

Rob Beschizza at 6:01 am Tue, May 17, 2011

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  • TharkLord

    Damn. What a shame they have to do that creepy “Polar Express” style of animation. I really enjoyed the bits of Tintin I read in Highlights Magazine as a kid. I wish Miyazaki would have done this… or The Abhorsen Trilogy. But then I live in a dream world. *sigh*

    • noah django

      seconding Miyazaki.

  • Anonymous

    what a bunch of negative ninnys.

    I for one think it is a great poster and am looking forward to see this movie. – that is if they dont ruin it by making it too modern.

  • noah django

    It’s likely I’ll skip this just to avoid the high likelihood of being disappointed.

    As mutants have pointed out, the CGI thing is a big sticking point. Since nobody gets proper (or any) visual arts training anymore, my concerns are likely not to come up *even if* the writers/directors/computer people “nail it.” Adapting a novel this way is fine, but with a comic, a particular visual style is already established, which this film seems ready to completely dismantle. The visual component in Hergé’s style is masterful, yet understated. Even for a comic, his outlines are very thick, which leads to facial expressions that only work in aggregate. You don’t see Hergé using extreme close-up, but you see it in every film; particularly with CG, there’s usually a dramatic showcase shot of a character’s face showing how detailed the effects are these days. meh. Those thick outlines also force Hergé to compose and color the panels a certain way so that they are balanced between showing just enough of a scene without being overcome by line. His use of color, particularly analogous hues to differentiate nearby objects, is strikingly well done by him. In order for that to succeed, the lighting is usually very flat and even-toned. When did Hergé ever use dramatic, noir-esque lighting like we see in this poster?

    In short, Tintin is built on visual sublimity. If a CGI christmas blockbuster is in any way sublime visually, I will eat my hat. If they wanted to truly bring Tintin to the big screen, they would have found a more visually faithful interpretation (if not textually) from someone like Wes Andersen, IMO.

  • Jody S

    Mo-crap? No thanks.

  • philipb

    @noah django : exactly, Herge established a style & look that’s as big a part of Tintin as the characters themselves.

  • johan,karlskrona

    I agree with everybody, it looks wrong.With comics and cartoons the visual style is the main I thing, we don’t want Garfield-monstrosities ever again. If you’re going for realism, then use actors. Milou looked allright though and most things apart from humanoids.

    But what about that music? Why? That’s what fucked up my LOTR-experience. I could live with the graphics but not that music, puhlease. John Wayne under attack by the injuns, yes, contemporary film, NO.

  • Anonymous

    Please, no.

  • Rotwang

    WHOOOAH!

  • Lobster

    Not Pictured: overt racism.

    • Anonymous

      Yes, and I’m SURE Spielberg and Jackson will be bringing us that, as well… \sarcasm

    • peterbruells

      Well, Racism on par with most works of that era that haven’t been heavily edited for language and attitudes.

  • Dethbaimaumau

    Please let this be good.

  • benjymous

    My OCD is very annoyed by the “Screenplay by … AND … & …”

    • Peter J Cat

      Maybe, but as I’m sure you know, “AND” and “&” have specific meanings in writing credits under WGA rules. In this case it means that Steven Moffat wrote the first draft(s) by himself, and Edgar Wright & Joe Cornish collaborated on the subsequent draft(s).

    • pborenstein

      Looks odd, but I think they wanted to get this grouping across:

      Steven Moffat + (Edgar Wright + Joe Cornish)

      • Thorzdad

        pborenstein is correct about the grouping.
        The correct reading in your head would be “Steven Moffat and the writing team of Edgar Wright & Joe Cornish.” This typical construct is actually pretty common in movie credits.

      • benjymous

        So “Steven Moffat With Edgar Wright and Joe Cornish” would work, and not annoy pedants :)

        • Anonymous

          Your OCD would be well served to learn Writer’s Guild of America rulings on credit. The use of “and” is for when writers don’t work together, while the ampersand is used for writers working as a team. In this case, WGA arbitration placed one writer in first position, which they usually grant to the original writer, while the second two writers were likely brought in as a team, or worked in concert together, probably to punch up the script (and considering that it’s Edgar Wright, probably to write gags and such).

    • Anonymous

      I’m going to say that Edgar & Joe worked as a team, separate from Steven…

  • SamSam

    Tintin.com seems to be down, but here’s a Google cache of another poster.

    I have a feeling I’m going to hate CGI Snowy…

  • Anonymous

    Blistering Barnacles! Starring…. Alison Bechdel?

  • Drpepperfan

    This has the single greatest group of writers I’ve ever seen. Steven Moffat, writer of probably the greatest episodes of the greatest show ever, Doctor Who. Edgar Wright, a man with a real passion and love for everything he does, made the awesome Pegg/Frost series, and the man who adapated Scott Pilgrim perfectly. And Joe Cornish, one half of the horrendously underrated Adam & Joe.

    And it’s directed by Spielberg.

    If this sucks, then logic and normallity has failed, and the universe may as well just implode.

  • Mujokan

    Tintin et Le Quai des Brumes?

  • Rob Beschizza

    Just out of interest, are the Belgians (and perhaps the French) at all pissed (“peesed?”) at the way Tintin is British in the translations? And now the movie is so British that its mere presence in the universe seems to create a surplus of unnecessary vowels.

  • Dethbaimaumau

    “In Theatres December 23rd 2011″

  • actionjustin

    Note the lack of faces in the trailer and Tintin’s obscured face. What possible justification is there for concealing human faces and emotional expression in a movie trailer… aside from the uncanny valley? A bad idea, executed unwisely, by good and wise filmmakers.

  • Dethbaimaumau

    Apple site has the trailer, predictably scored with the bog standard ‘Trailer Music’ (loud booms, scaling strings etc).

    Same old stuff.

  • sigismund

    @Rob : well, the french are juste disapointed that the main character isn’t played by Jimmy Sommerville… ;)

  • Jack Daniel

    Blistering barnacles! I just realized I’d been reading graphic novels since I was six (Thanks dad for the collection of old Tintin’s). My question is how do you think they’re going to pronounce his name, “tin-tin,” or the French “TAIHHN-TAIHHN?”

    • Peter J Cat

      If Peter Jackson gets his way it’ll be TÉ™ntÉ™n.

  • Kaepora

    They better get this right.

  • Gilbert Wham

    .writer of probably the greatest episodes of the greatest show ever, Doctor Who

    I put it to you, Sir, that the gentlemen to whom that sobriquet belongs is, in fact, Terrance Dicks (Tom Baker-era Dr Who=Best Dr Who. That is all)

    • Anonymous

      Robert Holmes had more to do with Tom Baker era Doctor Who than Terrance Dicks…

    • muteboy

      Yep. Also Terry Nation.

      Has anyone made any “Tintin and the Uncanny Valley” jokes yet?

  • Zan

    With Spielberg, Jackson, Moffat, and Wright involved there are only two ways this can go. Either it is going to be completely awesome, or it’s going to suck because you have four huge egos who are used to being in charge.

    • Scaramanga9

      I think Speilberg is the only real big ego there. All the rest have shown that they collaborate well with others.

  • Zan

    I guess we can also assume that John Williams will do the score, since 23 of the 24 major motion pictures directed by Spielberg have used Williams (The Color Purple was the one exception, and John Williams did compose the music for the main title on that film)

  • Anonymous

    Belgians’ gift to the world = Tin Tin

    French gift to the world = Can Can

  • tboy

    Great. They’re going to try and push past the Uncanny Valley again.

    Say what you like about the pace of technology making the impossible happen, but having to put with characters that just look wrong for 90 minutes has never been my cup of tea.

    I’m sure they’ll push past the barrier some day, and we’ll have animated characters indistinguishable from human actors.

    I just don’t want to be the guinea pigs who have to sit through attempt number… what is it, seven, eight? Especially if it means having to deal with the dead-eyed, waxy-skinned monstrosities who one is supposed to sympathise and root for.

    Before someone comes by and says that they nailed it with Avatar, may I remind them that the main CGI-related characters were all not human in the first place. So one has leeway with that.

  • _nemo_

    So I see Spielberg is using his buddy Zemeckis’ patented “Shoot real, charismatic actors in front of a greenscreen, then replace said actors with creepy CGI waxworks” technique.

  • SamSam

    Huh, it looks like my original link to the alternative poster didn’t work, because tintin.com, or at least the webcache of it, is an unnavigable Flash goop.

    Here’s a copy of the other poster:

    https://img.skitch.com/20110518-g96pp3nbraanbfb66fm7c1euf7.jpg

  • Nash Rambler

    All negative nelly-ism will be ignored; I loved Tintin as a kid, and if movie magic can make the story come alive for me, then it’ll be worth the price of admission.

  • braininavat

    That poster makes Tintin look like a prostitute.

  • Anonymous

    I won’t see this one. It’s another rubber-face, CG, dead-eyes animation like The Polar Express. Horrifying.

  • elisd

    Mille millards de mille sabords, This looks terrible! Instead of replicating Hergé’s clean lines, they’ve plunged straight into the uncanny valley. Tonnerre de Brest!

  • CountZero

    I have little emotional connection with TinTin, so, based on the writing team, I’ll give this the benefit of the doubt. Vis à vis the best Dr, I’ll grant Tom Baker was good, and the best of the middle period Doctors, but, up until Matt Smith, who I think is going to be one of the very best, William Hartnell was the absolute definitive Doctor. He was almost as scary as the Daleks, an old looking man who looked downright dangerous, with no daft eccentricities. I’m not basing my opinion on odd bits of film I’ve seen on TV, I watched Doctor Who from the very first episode, and Susan, the Doctor’s granddaughter, had a very unsettling effect on my very young self at the time, more profoundly than the Daleks ever did…

  • santoku

    My unbelievable Tintin fandom allows me to recognize that this poster was heavily influenced by the tenth panel on the sixth page of The Adventures of Tintin in The Land of Black Gold. Seriously, grab your copy and check it out.

    • Kimmo

      My unbelievable Tintin fandom allows me to recognize that this poster was heavily influenced by the tenth panel on the sixth page of The Adventures of Tintin in The Land of Black Gold. Seriously, grab your copy and check it out.

      Nice. Your unbelievable Tintin fandom also wins you a poster.

    • Anonymous

      Wow, nice catch there. Got my copy out, your absolutely right.

  • Greg P.

    I loved Tintin. I didn’t notice the racism in some of the early books until I revisited them recently, especially Tintin in the Congo (which was not available when I was a kid, surprise surprise). The treatment of Chinese and Indians seems very sympathetic for the time. Still, it’s sad that my childhood memories are now contaminated by the prejudices of Herge’s time.

  • Anonymous

    That was a creepy trailer. Bachi-Bouzouk!

  • whyisitso

    There is a trailer available on the international site:
    http://www.TinTin-Movie.net/

  • Anonymous

    Potentially, the great Steven Spielberg may have a found a sequel run of films in the Tintin series that could stretch to ten films or more. You are a superhero Steven Spielberg! Georges Prosper Remi (22 May 1907 – 3 March 1983), better known by the pen name Hergé, was a Belgian comics writer and artist. “Hergé” is the French pronunciation of “RG”, his initials reversed. His best known and most substantial work is The Adventures of Tintin comic book series, which he wrote and illustrated from 1929 until his death in 1983, leaving the twenty-fourth Tintin adventure Tintin and Alph-Art unfinished. His work remains a strong influence on comics, particularly in Europe. He was inducted into the Comic Book Hall of Fame in 2003. A lot will depend on this first film and but what an excellent choice of material by Steven Spielberg. Well done. Regards, DINESH R MAKWANA

  • dancentury

    Dan Savage wrote an article a while back that said Tin Tin was a “Peg Boy”. The poster art confirms this.