On DVD Now: Hugo

http://www.amazon.com/Hugo-Three-disc-Combo-Blu-ray-Digital/dp/B006OAXL92

I wasn’t exactly dying to watch this movie. I’d heard about it, seen previews, yawned. The fact that it won lots of snooty awards didn’t help.

But Saturday night came around and I was tired and sore from contorting myself most of the day trying to replace an almost-fits bathroom faucet. I hate plumbing, the outgoing part much more so than the incoming part, but I don’t really care at all for either. It’s all about fiddly parts. If you don’t have the exact right one, you’re doomed to use hammers, slip-wrenches and pliers. Knuckles will get busted, you will get damp, and there’s never any telling what that disgusting, soggy glob that just fell out of the trap is.

So I was not really picky. I’d scanned through the DISH-On-Demand offerings and couldn’t find anything better. Angel and Adam had mentioned wanting to see Hugo, I was indifferent, they won.

It didn’t help that the rental screen indicated that the movie was two hours and six minutes long. That’s about twenty more minutes than any movie should be.

But I was tired and sore, and had a box of wine beside me to take off some of the edge.

The movie is about an orphan boy that lives behind the walls at a Paris train station, circa 1931. His drunken uncle worked there keeping the clocks running. Once taught all the steps, the boy took it upon himself to be there caretaker in the frequent and later permanent absence of his uncle.
It's a very Disney-esque story, an orphaned critter uses spunk and charisma to rise above diversity, with predictable villainy and  pratfalls to follow, and become a hero. As far as story goes, it's nothing unique or especially deep.

He has access through tunnels, catwalks and other openings to just about every nook and cranny in the station, enabling him to spy on the travelers and venders below, unseen. We are shown how he watches the pastry shop for opportunities to steal food. We are never shown how he bathes, if he does at all, but then again it is France. (In 1789 the French revolted, some say they are to this day, still revolting.)

Some of the characters barely rise to the level of easy, lazy stereotype. Even though it is France, no one actually seems to speak French. In fact a key character, the station inspector, wounded in WWI and played by that obnoxious Borat guy, speaks not only in a non-French accent, but inexplicably in a near-cockney British one.

After about forty five minutes watching the kid skulk around looking for mechanical parts for his broken automaton, left to him by his recently deceased father (museum fire), he runs into the cranky old proprietor of a toy shop, who goes by one name, but is in fact a formerly famous movie maker, one Georges Méliès.

Silent movie buffs and students of the arts will recognize that name. He made hundreds of silent movies, some of the earliest ever made. If you’ve ever seen clips showing the jerky and stained scene of a scientist firing a large bullet-shaped capsule to the moon, where it lodges into the eye of the man in the moon, that’s his work.

The movie accurately describes most of the real film-maker’s plight. The only thing not factual is the bit about the boy and his broken automaton.

Man reluctantly helps boy, boy helps man, boy has a crush on the man’s god-daughter, etc. Inevitable, heart-warming happy ending ensues.

In the meantime, the transparent comic relief, Sacha Baron Cohen, three-stooges his way through the movie along with the real scene-stealer, his patient and long suffering Doberman, Max.

    This may sound like I didn’t care much for the movie. This would be mostly incorrect. This Scorsese work is visually stunning. The giant gears, steam venting, slender utilitarian spiral staircases, the large but delicate clockworks indicative of the period and place filmed with a subtle sepia tone are brilliant and engrossing. Originally shot in 3-D, the film in a modern 3-D capable theater I imagine, would be even more so. I personally don’t care for movies in 3-D, they make my head hurt. I prefer my movies the same way I prefer most women, with very few dimensions and silent, whenever possible.

The acting of the lead cast is splendid, even the kids did a fine job. I was a bit perturbed by the background players, they seemed to be barely-believable stereotypical and overly-caricatured French fops as if yanked from a Pepe LePew cartoon.

The story, though based somewhat around a real time, place and person, is far more about the visual appeal than the actual story and it is very, very successful on that front.

It is long, plan on an intermission or two, especially if you have dogs or middle-aged men  that need to go out frequently. Though I can’t say I loved the movie, it was a fine escape and certainly not awful, the boxed wine sort of  helped.

If you have a good TV and Blu-Ray player, you’ll probably enjoy it much more than you would on smaller, lower resolution devices.
Give it a shot, let me know what you think!