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Review: The Adventures of Tintin doesn’t mess with a good thing
Steven Spielberg has often flirted with the “boy-and-his-dog” archetype, although the dog is often played by an alien (E.T.), a sidekick (Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom), a robot (A.I.) or another animal (War Horse, which opens Christmas Day). In this one, a movie he’s been planning since the ’80s, the director reduces the formula to its simplest form. Boy + Dog = Adventure.
The boy is Tintin, an enterprising journalist of uncertain nationality, youthful but of indeterminate age. (Ostensibly Belgian, he’s voiced by 25-year-old Jamie Bell in his native English accent.) The dog is Snowy, an white fox terrier who’s either the smartest or second-smartest dog on film this year. (See Uggie in The Artist.)
The adventure — and they don’t call it The Adventures of Tintin for nothing — is a rollicking, Indiana Jones type of affair involving pirates, pickpockets, policemen, sunken treasure, wild chases, coded messages and something called the Milanese Nightingale, a MacGuffin if ever I heard of one. (Photo: Paramount)
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Tintinologists are divided by Spielberg’s The Adventures of Tintin
The Adventures of Tintin has been varyingly described as everything from “perfect family fare” to the cinematic equivalent of rape. So, yes, you could say it’s not your typical children’s movie.
Although the picture doesn’t open in Canada until Dec. 21 (Dec. 9 in Quebec), the question of whether it duly honours Herge’s original character is already the subject of fierce debate — most vocally among denizens of a little-known corner of study known as “Tintinology.”
