Starring Ben Kingsley, Sacha Baron Cohen, Asa Butterfield, Chloë Grace Moretz, Ray Winstone, Emily Mortimer, Christopher Lee, Helen McCrory, Michael Stuhlbarg, Frances de la Tour, Richard Griffiths, Jude Law
Directed by Martin Scorsese
Expectations: High, but really cautious. Everything I hear sounds good, but whenever I see footage it looks dumb.
OK, I’m going to try and rein in my negativity. I did like Hugo, but I take issue with much of it as a film. With all the film history stuff contained in the film Scorsese is preaching to the choir with me, and I doubt that any kids in the audience are going to take the film’s look back at the life’s work of George Méliès and run with it to their nearest DVD retailer to snatch up a copy of A Trip to the Moon. I don’t know… I think this is another case of me just being too jaded to truly appreciate the film at hand, although I have to say that I don’t think it’s an entirely well made film. For Scorsese to get so much respect for this movie is ridiculous as it shows very little of the clever, powerful director he once was. I have to imagine it’s because this is easily one of the safest and most boringly mainstream movies of his entire career, but hey, I generally hate movies about movies, so your mileage may vary.
Hugo is about a boy name Hugo who lives in the crawlspaces of the train station. He winds the clocks and pretty much keeps to himself, except to steal a little clockwork gear every once in a while. He does this because he’s got an automaton stashed away in his home, and he’s desperately trying to fix it. Despite this fantasy setup, the film is a lot more grounded than you’d expect it to be from the marketing. Don’t get me wrong, everything plays out in somewhat comical, ridiculous ways, but it still feels tied to our reality by all the film history lessons sprinkled throughout.