Tintin Forums

Its actually quite interesting to see people having highly varying opinions about the movie..and I agree with Blackisland that the Captain was done great injustice..he was portrayed a loser; a hopeless drunkard who has given up in life--which is absolutely not how he is shown in the books..at least after he meets Tintin..His character didn't deserve such a beating..

I also agree that Herge would be turning in his grave today had he seen the movie..and would be regretting his decision to permit Steven Spielberg to make a movie on his books..while not following his painstakingly written and illustrated storyline..

There are many more things..but having already mentioned them in my review in the previous posts, I choose not to repeat them again... :)

I'v just seen the movie yesterday at the theater (I live in the USA). I think that its well made. Even the shortest moments in it were made nice. I love it! I'm gonna get it when it comes on DVD.

You're really far off. They hardly respected the source material. Don't defend something that does not deserve to be defended. The sequence in the cellar has nothing to do with the Crab with the Golden Claws and whether or not they incorporated it, in other words it did not matter. This movie was not even close to the spirit of the books. Go back and re-read them and get back to me.

Moderator Note: There’s no need to quote another post (especially a long one) in its entirety - just quote an appropriate part. Your post has beenedited accordingly.

The Tintinologist Team

I finally watched the film yesterday, and posts 18-20 on this thread capture a lot of my own sentiments. I'm a lifetime fan of the books; my boyfriend only just read a few books recently. But we came out with the same reaction.

It began with a lot of promise, but slid down into an absolute mess about halfway through.

I was not expecting the film to be true to plot. In fact, I was excited about what an altered plot might offer (a new sense of mystery). However it seems that the film wasn't able to keep up any suspense, despite being quite over elaborate.

I was certainly expecting that it would be true to the character of Tintin. But it completely lacked the cleverness — the ungaudy cleverness — that I love so much about the series. I found the screenplay was okay at best, and cringeworthy at worst. I overheard a kid near me protest to his parents, "This movie isn't funny at all!!?" Haha.

The layout design was excellent, but as far as the characters go, it seemed like the baddies were far more well-designed than the goodies.

When I first heard about the project I was pretty skeptical. It seems justified. I'll leave it at that, as many of you have said the rest.

In the interests of keeping this forum a friendly place, please take extra care not to tip over into inadvertently sounding aggressive or disrespectful to fellow members when disagreeing with them, BlackIsland. I'm all for impassioned debate, and I'm not trying to censor or criticise your view of the movie (as you'll see a few pages back on this thread, I share some of your misgivings about it) but please try to avoid the rather rude and dictatorial tone you're showing towards Tintinrulz. He's taken the trouble to reply to all your points in some detail whilst still disagreeing with you. And even if he hadn't, he'd still be entitled to his own point of view.

The great thing about this thread is the wide range of completely differing views about the movie, and the way that everyone's been able to express their differing views without feeling the need to insult anyone else. Encountering different views to your own is surely the point of joining a forum like this in the first place.

I realise that many feel passionately about this movie for and against, and I'm not trying to dampen down the debate; I love a good argument! But this is only a movie we're arguing about, not who did what to whom in some recent civil war, so I don't think we need to insist that everyone shares our view or to criticise anyone's imagined lack of expertise on the source material. It's perfectly possible to have all the fun of strongly disagreeing with someone whilst keeping the tone friendly, which I'm sure is what we all want here.

BlackIsland, I'm a huge fan of Tintin, I know the books well. I still believe that the movie was mostly true to the spirit and tone of the albums. There's no need to get aggressive with me. There's enough of that crap on other forums and Tintin blogs (tintinology for one).

OK, Tintinrulz, I understand but to be fair you commented and on almost everything I wrote. I hope the moderator Balthazar can take note of that.
He replied and I don't agree with Tintinrulz's comments really, but we can agree to disagree.
To be honest, I have a lot of years experience with these books and the source material. I don't know everything but know a lot. I could have picked the movie apart more but it would have been a longer post.
The movie was just so far off and it's too bad it was a disappointment. The worst part of it is I knew the movie would be like this. I guess I am surprised that so many fans that are passionate about Tintin and Herge would actually think what Jackson and more importantly Spielberg have done with the source material as being OK. It really is unbelievable.

You know, if it wasn't for Moulinsart's draconian control over intellectual property, perhaps someone would do just that. Sometimes even the best films end up getting that treatment.

I did think some of the characterisation was a little off, but it was certainly better than giving Tintin a girlfriend!

Well, there are different aspects of Tintin that draw different people to it. For me, it's character relations and friendships. Spielberg put more of that in, so of course I'm going to be thrilled about it, just like I am to see the Captain given an expanded role.

Also, I'm sure I can't be the only one who cringes at the Captain knocking out Tintin with the empty bottle in the original Crab With the Golden Claws. Nelvana changed it, Spielberg changed it, and I am so glad of that. Even in the future books by Hergé, the Captain never attacks Tintin again, even if drunk; that was an out-of-character moment for him in Crab, and is one of those things that, in my opinion, is better off changed.

Thing is, if Spielberg had kept everything verbatim from the books, he'd have a bunch of people complaining that he had no imagination to expand or change things. It's really a lose-lose situation for him--either he can please the ones who want things the same, or please the ones who want something different, but he can't make everyone happy.

Everyone is going to have an opinion that differs. All I know is that I haven't been this enthralled by a movie in years, and I will be snapping it up the moment it's released on DVD!

Well, I don't agree..being the "great imaginative" ET and Avataar movie creator that he is, he could have done anything..and I mean just anything..with Tintin..what I can't understand is why he chose to do THIS... :(

He could have easily created a movie that pleased each and everyone..He could have used his imagination and given Tintin a whole new adventure all together..I would have absolutely loved that movie!! (wasn't Lake of Sharks a film book as well?) what I couldn't and still can't digest about the movie he actually created is the fact that he muddled up and jumbled up 3-4 of Herge's painstakingly created masterpieces, and went on to create a highly unsatisfying (at least to me) mixture out of it...and I will never forgive Spielberg for that.. Tintin and Herge never deserved that..