Posted on Wednesday, 21 December 2011

HUGO (Scorsese, 2011) - I was at a conference in the U.S. last week, which is the reason for the dearth of updates. Movie withdrawal symptoms were getting too much for me half-way through, so I convinced some colleagues to join me (by taxi, no less) to go see this one, which doesn’t come out here until February. And it was perfect: exciting, occasionally breathtaking (like in the virtuoso opening shot) and, in the last 45 minutes or so, simply magical. Oh, there are some flaws - it’s clearly a kid’s movie in some ways, with the themes clearly spelled out and some overly expository history lessons thrown in - but I didn’t care: Scorsese manages to show just how transformative movies can be, making an impassioned and stirring plea for film preservation. Is his big clock scene as great as the one from SAFETY LAST he also shows? No. But if only one person goes to check out Harold Lloyd, it’ll be worth it. Is the repetition of the (probably apocryphal) L’ARRIVEE D’UN TRAIN A LA GARE DE CIOTAT scare a bit on the nose? Sure - but Scorsese makes these old movies seem alive, vibrant, and manages to convey just how wondrous they were. How wondrous the are. I may be a sucker, but I adored it.

HUGO (Scorsese, 2011) - I was at a conference in the U.S. last week, which is the reason for the dearth of updates. Movie withdrawal symptoms were getting too much for me half-way through, so I convinced some colleagues to join me (by taxi, no less) to go see this one, which doesn’t come out here until February. And it was perfect: exciting, occasionally breathtaking (like in the virtuoso opening shot) and, in the last 45 minutes or so, simply magical. Oh, there are some flaws - it’s clearly a kid’s movie in some ways, with the themes clearly spelled out and some overly expository history lessons thrown in - but I didn’t care: Scorsese manages to show just how transformative movies can be, making an impassioned and stirring plea for film preservation. Is his big clock scene as great as the one from SAFETY LAST he also shows? No. But if only one person goes to check out Harold Lloyd, it’ll be worth it. Is the repetition of the (probably apocryphal) L’ARRIVEE D’UN TRAIN A LA GARE DE CIOTAT scare a bit on the nose? Sure - but Scorsese makes these old movies seem alive, vibrant, and manages to convey just how wondrous they were. How wondrous the are. I may be a sucker, but I adored it.

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