Tintin Forums

Hi all. Found this at IMDB.com:

"Gollum" Technology To Be Used for Tintin Movies


Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson intend to use performance-capture technology -- used to create the character of Gollum in the Lord of the Rings movies -- to turn Georges Remi's comic-book drawings in his Adventures of Tintin series into three features that will be shot back-to-back beginning next year, Daily Variety reported today (Tuesday). The trade publication said that the three films -- one will be directed by Spielberg, another by Jackson; there is no decision on who will direct the third -- will likely be released through DreamWorks Animation. It quoted Spielberg as saying that the drawings by Remi, who used the name Hergé, will have the look of a live-action film, "and yet Peter and I felt that shooting them in a traditional live-action format would simply not honor the distinctive look of the characters and world that Hergé created." Jackson said that the characters will "look photorealistic ... They look exactly like real people -- but real Hergé people."

UK readers of "The Times" may want to pick up a copy today. Full page article on page 3 on the upcoming movie.

I've posted the link to the online version for other members.

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/film /article1796105.ece

More details via the CBC - links to Peter Jackson and WETA workshop:
http://www.cbc.ca/arts/film/story/2007/05/15/tintin-movies.html?ref=rs s

It's mentioned in the above article that PJ has already worked out a 20min. test reel using motion capture technology - which would suggest to me that they have plans to make more of an *animated* feature.

Fantastic!

Boy! I must say that Tintin flooded the headlines in Hollywood, London, Paris, Brussels, Canada, all over the world including my country, which The Straits Times reported about Tintin at the back page. Sources say that it's set for a 2009 release, in time for Tintin's 80th Birthday i must hope.

Wonder what my friends, Randolph, Yong Jie, Isabel and my class will say about it this morning.

P.S: I'm 8 hours ahead of the forum's clock.

Well the BBC news was full of the story today! I wasn't sure if it would be fully CGI or whether there would just be CGI elements like most other movies?

So will Peter Jacksons or Steven Spielbergs attempt be the first one?

R

Regarding the choice of the 3 feature films:

IMHO logically they'll have to be the 3 double albums (Unicorn/Reckham, Seven Crystal Balls/Prisoners of the Sun, Destination Moon/Explorers of the Moon), as they are probably the most well-known and beloved adventures of all (well the Moon may be dated by now, but still one of the best).

I don't know how they can get around the not-so-universally-PC historical backgrounds of the early adventures (like Congo, America and the Blue Lotus) for a Hollywood adaptation targeted for modern international audiences, most of them know little about Tintin.

But if a fan-boy can dream, I would like to see one of films being Tintin and Alph-Art. Perhaps a film adaptation with hopefully a satisfactory ending is more acceptable than someone else penning and completing the final adventure.

Good shout editman.

I don't think they'll choose early adventures anyway, Calculus and especially Haddock are necessary for the movie.
Alph-Art is out of reach, Moulinsart won't allow that I'm sure.

If I could give only 3 words of advice to those in charge of this endeavour, they would be:

Don't screw up!

mondrian
I don't think they'll choose early adventures anyway, Calculus and especially Haddock are necessary for the movie.

It depends on whether they see these three movies as the basis of a further series, or if they think it will be limited to just the three, I suppose. Were they to be looking at as many films as possible, they might feel it harder to go back and do the non-Haddock, non-Calculus ones later, having already established those characters.
Also by establishing from the get go that there will be a trilogy, perhaps they will be develping a story arc whereby the characters get introduced over three films.
Has anyone picked up on the fact that the movies are not only to be done in computer animation, but also in digital 3-D? Tintin is going IMAX! (...or whatever other digital format for 3-D is coming...)

The target animation style sounds fascinating! From the article in the Times:


Just imagine - Hergé's colourful character designs applied to photo-realistic scenes. It'd make for a strangely surreal (and quite unique) style that could possibly work very well.