I saw it this past weekend and didn’t think much of it.
The story really didn’t hold up to the very nice look and feel of the film. The pacing seemed very off to me, and none of the characters were particularly likeable, even the plucky orphans. Sasha Baron Cohen was wasted in a terribly unfunny pastiche role. Ben Kingsley did his best with some very odd motivations - he’s horribly angry about not very much, which seems totally unrealistic to me.
Horribly angry about not very much?? Perhaps he’s a bit peeved that he lives in anonymity despite having been a true pioneer? Or that his life’s work - his passion - has been destroyed, never to be seen again? Or that he now must work at a menial job in a cramped storefront with nothing but time to reflect on how all his dreams have been squashed?
Yeah, his anger is totally out of left field.
mmm
If the guy made Gangs of New york then it should be a concern.
I did enjoy Hugo. The best part of the 3D is that it made the ancient footage pop enough for my modern eyes. It made it easier to see what was going on and appreciate the technical acheivement.
I thought he was more than a bit of an asshole to the kid, particularly over (pretend) burning his notebook. What was his motive for that? Even if the past was too painful for him to face … he’s making this boy think, for no good reason I could understand, that he destroyed his only valuable possession! Seems a trifle harsh for attempting to steal a broken clockwork mouse.
That being noted, I liked - but did not love - this movie. The movie sure looked great, and was about an interesting topic, but somehow - sort of like a broken clock ( 
) - the parts did not really connect for me.
Sounds like it might be interesting, though I’d have to find it in standard format (ThreeDee gives me a headache within a few minutes).
I don’t disagree with your spoilerized assessment, Malthus. But I still contend that he had plenty to be bitter about.
mmm
Georges Méliès was a wonderful movie. Every time he was on screen, it lit up. And the sections in the past were the most wonderful evocation of the earliest days of movies ever done.
Oh, the movie was about Hugo? Why? He’s a boring little drip. He has no story and he’s played by someone who isn’t an actor. One expression and one tone of voice. Chloë Grace Moretz did blow him off the screen. Ben Kingsley blew them both off the screen. The best thing is now that he has achieved his purpose he can go die.
There weren’t a dozen people in the audience tonight at a Saturday evening prime time slot. Every trailer shown was for an animated film, except for Mirror, Mirror, the Snow White adaptation. This isn’t a kid’s movie, though. It’s thoroughly an adult film. And if they’re trying to push it toward family audiences, it’s no wonder there’s no audience at all. The 3-D effects and cinematography were good but the showing (in Real 3-D) gave me a huge headache, and I’m not normally bothered by 3-D. Probably an individual theater effect but that’s what hurts the reputation of 3-D films.
Prediction: no word of mouth. And no major Oscar noms. Everybody who wanted to see Scorsese went the first week, the box office will tank this week, and nobody will want to climb aboard this sinking ship.
No Major Oscar noms? Hugo just won the National Board of Review for Best Picture of 2011. I don’t feel like looking up stats but the vast majority of NBR winners go on to get Best Picture Oscar nominations. Plus it’s mainly about film history. Who do you think nominates the Oscars? Plus it’s Scorsese. Nuff said. Films don’t have to be blockbusters to be nominated for Oscars, thank goodness.
I predict nominations for Best Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Editing, Visual Effects, Costumes & Art Direction. Maybe one or both of the Sound categories, Makeup, Cinematography & Ben Kingsley Supporting Actor.
Asa Butterfield can act, he just doesn’t do kid histronics. Watch The Boy In The Striped Pajamas.
Best Picture will probably be a knock down drag out between Hugo and The Artist. I think The Artist will win but I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if Hugo won.
What? Hazanavicius and Dujardin’s The Artist?? I thought it got released in less than 5 theatres in all of the States. If you’re talking about that movie, I’m really surprised.
If The National Board of Review already handed out its awards, then the voting must have been done before the film officially hit theaters. That’s the difference between critics’ awards and the Oscars. The Academy has been going for small films in recent years, but nobody in their right minds believes that the box office doesn’t count. Best Picture goes to those who exceed expectations, not fail to live up to them. And Scorsese already wrongly got his lifetime achievement award for The Departed.
That may be an argument more for Hugo not winning more than not getting nominated, and there’ll likely be more than 5 pictures nominated again this year. I’ll still bet that the buzz fades away and that Hugo also fails to live up to its expectations.
I’ll take that action, considering that both critics and audiences are nearly unanimous in their praise. Hardly seems sporting, though.
That’s because The Artist is in “Limited Release” which is Standard Operating Procedure for Awards season movies. It’ll be rolling out slowly over the next several weeks, with steam picking up as Awards season goes on. I’m sure they would love for it to still be in the theaters around Oscar time and this is the way to do it. It hasn’t opened in Chicago yet, though it was Closing Night film at the Chicago International Film Festival (which I didn’t attend). It’s been playing film festivals and building up word of mouth since this year’s Cannes Film Festival in May. The Artist is a tricky movie to market. French? Black and White? SILENT?? yet it’s been a crowd-pleaser for those rarified crowds who’ve had a chance to see it. I predict it will go from “Never heard of it” to “Can’t stop hearing about it” for many people over the next 3 months, much like Slumdog Millionaire did, though I don’t expect it to be as popular as that film.
Back to Hugo…
Voting was done the day they announced the awards, which was last Tuesday, which was after the movie opened in theaters.
The only other awards body who’ve announced are the New York Film Critics, and Hugo came in 3rd place after the winner The Artist, and other nominee Melancholia. There’s a whole avalanche of awards season mentions on the verge of crashing down on humanity.
Hugo’s been out 12 days and has made more than Best Picture winner The Hurt Locker made in its entire run, and the awards buzz hasn’t kicked in yet. It also hasn’t opened in other countries or at least, no totals have yet been added to Box Office Mojo.
No, buzz won’t fade away, it’s only just begun. Sure I could be wrong and The Artist might eclipse it here there and everywhere, but it’s not going to be forgotten by anyone in the film community. It doesn’t matter if or what it ultimately wins at the Oscars, it’ll be nominated and talked-about. A lot. As far as living up to “expectations,” whose expectations? Yours? It’s an arthouse kid’s movie, nobody expects it to be a blockbuster. It’s (IMO) a future classic that will live on and be cherished for decades. Lots of classics don’t make much money, or get awards.
I should have said “I think it’s being perceived as an arthouse kid’s movie” but adults will get the most short-term out of it. It’s hard to market, and frankly, thank goodness films that are hard to market still exist.
See, that’s where we disagree. I think it was an interesting failure. Nothing wrong with that. Scorsese has made them before and so have all other good directors. But interesting failures also don’t make much money or get awards.
Hugo’s budget was astronomical. This article has an unnamed source that says $170 million. (Nobody ever believes studio numbers, but even those are “less than $150 million,” which in real terms means $150 mil.) The Hurt Locker’s budget was $15 million.
How is Hugo doing? It fell about a third this weekend, despite adding over 500 screens or 44%. That means more than a 50% drop per screen for the second weekend. Other movies that got good word of mouth behaved differently. Slumdog Millionaire, for example, kept rising and never had a 32% drop in grosses until its 17th week.
The buzz for Hugo is over. It will be transferred over to The Artist among the crowd who cares about such things. Somewhere between 3 and 6 possible best picture movies are debuting or breaking wide in the next few weeks (including The Artist). Any of those with good reviews and returns will jump over Hugo.
It really is only just starting. The Washington Film Critics nominations just came out. The Artist led the awards (mainly because of acting awards, which will also happen at the Oscars) but Hugo has nominations for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Acting Ensemble, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography & Best Score (which I forgot to mention above). They don’t do the more technical awards. Most critics’ groups don’t.
I don’t think you understand how BELOVED Hugo is among Academy voters. I don’t follow many “celebrities” (names the masses would recognize), but I follow some people who Re-tweet their thoughts about Hugo on Twitter.
This is a movie about movies, about the love of movies, about the history of movies, about film preservation, by a beloved film director who’s positively famous for his deep love of movies. Who cares what the masses want, like or do? Totally tanking will not keep Hugo out of the Oscars. The critics love it (94%!) and it’s going to be nominated by almost every critics awards out there, and if we’re talking about Oscars, and we pretty much are, we’re talking about the people who vote on Oscars, and the people who vote on Oscars, people actively involved in film, are going gaga over both Hugo and The Artist. I understand what you’re saying about box office, but I completely disagree with your assessment of its Oscar nomination chances.
Btw, here are the major films most often touted to be possible Best Picture contenders, barring an out and out surprise. There are 5 major movies that haven’t been released wide or at all yet, marked with a *, in the order of likelihood they’ll be nominated, in my opinion.
The Artist
Hugo
Midnight in Paris
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
War Horse
The Descendants
Moneyball
J Edgar
The Help
Tree of Life
Margin Call
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Loud/Close and Girl are only last because they haven’t been seen much yet. Either could jump to near the top in the next couple of weeks, especially Loud/Close since it’s a Stephen Daldry film and every film he’s ever made has gotten major Oscar nominations (Billy Elliot, The Hours, The Reader) and because it’s supposed to be all heartwarming and stuff.
Tintin is still to be released but that will be nominated in the Animated category.
I can often be lousy at predictions but I really do think The Artist, Hugo, Midnight In Paris, TTSS and War Horse (unfortunately) are locks, the rest up in the air.
I saw it today, at 1 pm on a Sunday, and the showing was sold out. There was loud applause from the audience at the end.
Equipoise, what’s wrong with War Horse? I saw the Broadway play last year and thought it was wonderful. Does the film not measure up?
I’m glad to hear that.
I haven’t seen the play or read the book if there is one. I went in completely cold without even watching a trailer beforehand. I shouldn’t have said “unfortunately” because it’s the wrong thread, and I let my personal prejudices get in the way. It IS a good movie, possibly a great movie, I don’t know. I just know that I hated big swaths of it because[spoiler]so much screen time is devoted to horses being hurt/killed/beaten/tortured/abused it was painful and exhausting. I spent much of the running time cringing and in tears at what the horses were going through. It was very very realistic even if they didn’t show the worst of it.
Yes yes yes I know it’s all fake and that “no animals were harmed during the making of this movie” but isn’t the point of a movie to make you THINK it’s real? And if you’re suspending your disbelief you’re naturally feeling emotionally drawn to the animals and what they’re going through. And anyway, even if you keep telling yourself “It’s FAKE, it’s FAKE, it’s CGI, it’s FAKE!” you know in your heart of hearts that what the real horses went through during the war, and any war, was probably 10x worse and you’re just seeing a little bit of what it must have been like, which is even MORE depressing.
Such holiday cheer, I tell ya. It’s going to scar a generation of kids. Unlike Hugo, which will give delightful future hobbies and careers to so many.
War Horse is beautifully written, directed, acted, shot, made. Everything about it deserves awards consideration. I just couldn’t take the torture and abuse. I hate seeing animals get hurt. In small bursts when it’s important to the plot I can deal, again because I know it’s not real, but this was an onslaught of slaughter and terror and hurt of animals who, unlike humans, had no choices to be where they were and be doing what they were doing.[/spoiler]
I think the film is absolutely assured at least 5 Oscar nods–Picture, Director, Cinematography, Editing, Art Direction. Other categories (Sound Mixing, Costume Design, Adapted Screenplay) are certainly possible too. But aside from the brilliant sets and set decoration, I have a hard time seeing it win anything. While it’s obviously a labor of love, I found the movie too emotionally remote. I’m a film historian and archivist by training and profession, so this film should be right up my alley, but there was nothing about Hugo’s story that resonated in any way. Melies becomes the central character eventually, but in the meantime, we’re supposed to care about your classic (and not too compelling) Resourceful Orphan and his Big Mystery. It will pick up plenty of craft and technical accolades, and the film will definitely push buttons with hardcore cinephiles and Scorsese admirers, but the film doesn’t have any kind of emotional catharsis that is usually standard for the Academy–certainly not compared to more emotionally manipulative (be it playful or tragic) fare out this season. Kudos to Marty for making exactly the movie he wanted to make; but Raging Bull or GoodFellas tell us more about how much he loves movies without being so on-the-nose about it.
Saw it yesterday in a half full theater with no obvious reaction from the audience when it was over. Though one old guy was shouting to his wife as they left “Did you like it?” and she said “eh!” though I couldn’t tell if that was her review or a request for repeating the question.
I’m still trying to decide how much I liked it. The 3-D did nothing for me, though it was generally a very attractive movie (some scenes looked way too CGI for me but I assume that was intentional).
I think ultimately it had a lot of buildup without much payoff. Instead of us experiencing Milies’s pain they just show us that he’s an asshole and then tell us later in a quick flashback why. Not enough of a connection for me to care.
The balance just felt off, even acknowledging it was a genre shifting movie which does tend to render the first parts irrelevant to the second part. I loved the history lesson of it. I loved the blending of the real train accident into Hugo’s dream. I loved many, many little moments (though really didn’t like the Frances de la Tour/Richard Griffiths flirting).
But I don’t think I enjoyed it all that much.
I thought it looked gorgeous and the 3D was very nice, and I’m not a fan of 3D at all.
But the film itself left me cold. It seemed disjointed, like the first half and the second half didn’t fit together very well. It lagged quite a bit for me. A number of times I felt quite bored.
The kids were alright. I’ve seen both in other things before and thought they were both better in those other things. The girl in particular gave some horrendous line readings where she seemed to misjudge the tone of the scene she was in.
On top of that Scorsese seemed to be dropping Amelie-ish scenes into it. In particular the scenes with the two older people flirting, and the romance between Sacha Baron Cohen and the flower seller.
It just seemed to be a messy film. All of these bits didn’t seem to belong in the same film as each other. The saving grace was how incredible it looked. The cinematography, and the effects and the 3D were really great. So I’m glad I went to see it in the cinema. But I wouldn’t be recommending it to anyone.