Steven Spielberg’s motion-capture animated film, starring Jamie Bell as the cub reporter, is an absolute joy
Steven Spielberg’s motion-capture animated film, starring Jamie Bell as the cub reporter, is an absolute joy.
Deploying the latest 3D and performance-capture trickery, the film remains faithful to Hergé's original comic books - right down to Tintin's iconic quiff.
Bell’s plucky hero is backed by a well-cast line-up of mostly British actors, including Andy Serkis as whisky-soaked sea dog Captain Haddock, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost as bungling detectives Thomson and Thompson and Daniel Craig as the dastardly villain of the piece.
The story, niftily woven together from episodes from three Hergé tales, sends Tintin and faithful, scene-stealing dog Snowy on a globetrotting treasure hunt after he buys a model ship from a market stall and discovers a clue to the whereabouts of a long-lost fortune in pirate plunder.
Along the way, there are breathtaking chases, cliff-hanging suspense and fearless derring-do that give the action the same giddy, helter-skelter dash Spielberg brings to the best of his live-action adventures.
With a trio of British screenwriters (Steven Moffat, Edgar Wright and Joe Cornish) peppering the script with neat visual and verbal gags, this is a corker of a movie.
