Hugo (film)
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Hugo is a 2011 3D adventure drama film based on Brian Selznick's novel The Invention of Hugo Cabret about a boy who lives alone in a Paris railway station and the enigmatic owner of a toy shop there. It is directed by Martin Scorsese and written by John Logan. It is a co-production of Graham King's GK Films and Johnny Depp's Infinitum Nihil. The film stars Asa Butterfield, Chloë Grace Moretz, Ben Kingsley, Sacha Baron Cohen, Ray Winstone, Emily Mortimer, and Jude Law.
Hugo is Scorsese’s first film shot in 3D, of which the filmmaker remarked: "I found 3D to be really interesting, because the actors were more upfront emotionally. Their slightest move, their slightest intention is picked up much more precisely." The film was distributed by Paramount Pictures and released in the U.S. on 23 November 2011.
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Plot
In 1931, Hugo Cabret, a young boy whose mother has died, lives with his father, a master clockmaker in Paris. Hugo's father takes him to see films and loves the films of Georges Méliès best of all. Hugo's father dies in a museum fire, and Hugo is taken away by his uncle, an alcoholic watchmaker who is responsible for maintaining the clocks in the railway station. His uncle teaches him to take care of the clocks, then disappears. Hugo lives between the walls of the station, maintaining the clocks, stealing food and working on his father's most ambitious project: repairing a broken automaton — a mechanical man who is supposed to write with a pen. Hugo steals mechanical parts in the station to repair the automaton, but he is caught by a toy store owner who takes away Hugo's blueprints for the automaton. The automaton is missing one part — a heart–shaped key. Convinced that the automaton contains a message from his father, Hugo goes to desperate lengths to fix the machine. He gains the assistance of Isabelle, a girl close to his age and the goddaughter of the toy shop owner. He introduces Isabelle to the movies, which her godfather has never let her see. Isabelle turns out to have the key to the automaton. When they use the key to activate the automaton, it produces a drawing of a film scene Hugo remembers his father telling him about. They discover that the film was created by Georges Méliès, Isabelle's godfather, an early — but now neglected and disillusioned — cinema legend, and that the automaton was a beloved creation of his from his days as a magician. In the end, the children reconnect Georges with his past and with a new generation of cinema aficionados which has come to appreciate his work.
Cast
- Ben Kingsley as Papa Georges, the toy shop owner
- Asa Butterfield as Hugo Cabret
- Chloë Grace Moretz as Isabelle, Georges' goddaughter
- Sacha Baron Cohen as Inspector Gustav
- Jude Law as Hugo's father, a clockmaker
- Christopher Lee as Monsieur Labisse, the bookshop owner
- Helen McCrory as Mama Jeanne, Georges' wife
- Michael Stuhlbarg as René Tabard, a film historian
- Emily Mortimer as Lisette, the flower girl
- Ray Winstone as Claude Cabret, Hugo's uncle.
- Frances de la Tour as Madame Emile, the owner of the café
- Richard Griffiths as Monsieur Frick, the newspaper seller
- Marco Aponte as train engineer assistant
Video game
THQ and Paramount Digital Entertainment will release the game on the Nintendo DS and Nintendo 3DS with Jude Law reprising his role as Hugo's father and Joshua Seth playing Hugo Cabret (replacing Asa Butterfield).
Production
GK Films acquired the screen rights to The Invention of Hugo Cabret shortly after the book was published in 2007. Hugo was filmed at London’s Shepperton Studios as well as on locations in London, Paris and the Nene Valley Railway near Peterborough, who also loaned their original Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits rolling stock to the studio.
Reception
Critical reception
Hugo has received universal critical acclaim. Review tallying website Rotten Tomatoes reported that 157 of the tallied 168 reviews were positive, for a score of 93% and a certification of "fresh". In comparison, Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, gave the film an average score of 83 based on 41 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".
Roger Ebert of Chicago Sun-Times gave the film four-out-of-four stars saying "Hugo is unlike any other film Martin Scorsese has ever made, and yet possibly the closest to his heart: a big-budget, family epic in 3-D, and in some ways, a mirror of his own life. We feel a great artist has been given command of the tools and resources he needs to make a movie about—movies."
Hugo was selected for the Royal Film Performance 2011 with a screening at the Odeon, Leicester Square in London on Monday, 28 November 2011 in the presence of TRH The Prince of Wales and The Duchess of Cornwall in support of the Cinema and Television Benevolent Fund.
Richard Corliss of Time named it one of the Top 10 Best Movies of 2011, saying "Scorsese's love poem, rendered gorgeously in 3-D, restores both the reputation of an early pioneer and the glory of movie history — the birth of a popular art form given new life through a master's application of the coolest new techniques".
Top ten lists
The film has appeared on the following critics' top ten lists for the best films of 2011:
| Critic | Publication | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Sasha Stone | Awards Daily | 1st |
| David Denby | The New Yorker | 1st |
| Noel Murray | A.V. Club | 2nd |
| Glenn Kenny | MSN Movies | 2nd |
| Peter Hartlaub | San Francisco Chronicle | 2nd |
| Richard Corliss | Time | 2nd |
| Roger Ebert | Chicago Sun-Times | 4th |
| Lisa Schwarzbaum | Entertainment Weekly | 4th |
| Richard Brody | The New Yorker | 4th |
| Peter Paras | E! Online | 5th |
| Template:N/a | MTV | 5th |
| Keith Phipps | A.V. Club | 6th |
| Todd McCarthy | The Hollywood Reporter | 6th |
| Peter Travers | Rolling Stone | 6th |
| Template:N/a | TV Guide | 7th |
| J. Hoberman | Village Voice | 8th |
| Kim Morgan | MSN Movies | 9th |
| Sean Axmaker | MSN Movies | 10th |
| Glenn Heath Jr. | Slant | 10th |
| Jeff Simon | Buffalo News | Template:N/a |
| Manohla Dargis | The New York Times | Template:N/a |
| Phillip French | The Observer | Template:N/a |
Accolades
- Pending - Best Motion Picture - Drama
- Pending - Best Director - Martin Scorsese
- Pending - Best Original Score - Howard Shore
New York Film Critics Circle Award
- Nominated –(2nd place) Best Director
- Nominated –(3rd place) Best Film
Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association Awards
- Best Director - Martin Scorsese
- Best Art Direction – Dante Ferretti
- Nominated – Best Film
- Nominated – Best Acting Ensemble
- Nominated – Best Adapted Screenplay - John Logan
- Nominated – Best Cinematography - Robert Richardson
- Nominated – Best Score - Howard Shore
San Diego Film Critics Society Awards
- Best Production Design - Dante Ferretti
- Nominated – Best Film
- Nominated – Best Director Martin Scorsese
- Nominated – Best Adapted Screenplay - John Logan
- Nominated - Best CinematographyRobert Richardson
- Nominated – Best EditingThelma Schoonmaker
- Nominated – Best Score - Howard Shore
Boston Society of Film Critics Award
- Best Director - Martin Scorsese
- Nominated – Best Film
- Nominated – (2nd place) Best Cinematography - Robert Richardson
- Nominated – (2nd place) Best Editing - Thelma Schoonmaker
Los Angeles Film Critics Association
- Nominated –(2nd place) Best Director – Martin Scorsese
- Nominated – Best Production Design – Dante Ferretti
Las Vegas Film Critics Society
- Best Family Film
- Best Best Film Editing - Thelma Schoonmaker
- Best Youth in Film
- Nominated – Best Film
Indiana Film Critics Association
- Nominated – Best Film
- Nominated – (2nd place) Best Musical Score
Broadcast Film Critics Association
- Best Picture - Pending
- Best Director - Martin Scorsese - Pending
- Best Young Actor/Actress - Asa Butterfield - Pending
- Best Adapted Screenplay - John Logan - Pending
- Best Cinematography - Robert Richardson -Pending
- Best Editing - Thelma Schoonmaker -Pending
- Best Production Design - Dante Ferretti - Pending
- Best Score - Howard Shore - Pending
- Best Costume Design – Sandy Powell - Pending
- Best Visual Effects - Robert Legato - Pending
- Best Sound - Pending
- Best Youth Actress - Chloe Grace Moretz - Pending
Chicago Film Critics Association
- Nominated - Template:Best Picture
- Nominated - Template:Best Director - Martin Scorsese
- Nominated - Template:Best Adapted Screenplay - John Logan
- Nominated - Template:Best Cinematography - Robert Richardson
- Nominated - Template:Best Score - Howard Shore
- Best Picture - Pending
- Best Director - Martin Scorsese - Pending
- Best Adapted Screenplay - John Logan - Pending
- Best Cinematography - Robert Richardson -Pending
- Best Production Design - Dante Ferretti - Pending
- Best Costume Design – Sandy Powell - Pending
- Best Visual Effects - Robert Legato - Pending
- Best Live Action Family Film - Pending
- Nominated - Template:Best Picture
- Nominated - Template:Best Director - Martin Scorsese
- Best Picture - Pending
- Best Director - Martin Scorsese - Pending
- Best Art Direction and Production Design - Dante Ferretti, Francesca Lo Schiavo - Pending
- Best Cinematography - Robert Richardson -Pending
- Best Visual Effects - Robert Legato - Pending
Online Film Critics Society Awards
- Best Picture - Pending
- Best Director - Martin Scorsese - Pending
- Best Cinematography - Robert Richardson -Pending
Alliance for Women Film Journalist
- Best Picture - Pending
- Best Director - Martin Scorsese - Pending
- Best Adapted Screenplay - John Logan - Pending
- Best Cinematography - Robert Richardson -Pending
- Best Editing - Thelma Schoonmaker -Pending
References to real-world history
The overall backstory and primary features of Georges Méliès' life as depicted in the film are largely accurate: he did become interested in film after seeing a demonstration of the Lumière brothers' camera, he was a magician and toymaker, he experimented with automata, he did own a theatre (Theatre Robert-Houdin), he was forced into bankruptcy, his film stock was reportedly melted down for its cellulose, he became a toy salesman at the Montparnasse station, and he was eventually awarded the Légion d'honneur (Legion of honor) medal after a period of terrible neglect. Many of the early silent films shown in the movie are Méliès' actual works such as Le voyage dans la lune (1902).
The automaton was inspired by one made by the Swiss watchmaker Henri Maillardet, which Selznick had seen in the Franklin Museum, Philadelphia It is similar to two famous Jaquet-Droz automata—the Writer and the Draughtsman.
A dream sequence in the film depicts the famous Gare Montparnasse railway derailment.
Emil Lager, Ben Addis, and Robert Gill make cameo appearances as Django Reinhardt, the father of jazz guitar, Salvador Dali, the Spanish surrealist painter, and James Joyce, the Irish writer, respectively. The names of all three characters appear towards the end of the film's cast credit list.
