“Hugo” is a strange movie. I’m not referring to its wondrous atmosphere, the mysterious automaton at its center, or the odd assortment of characters who populate it. No, I’m referring to simpler facts. “Hugo” is based on Brian Selznick’s “The Invention of Hugo Cabret,” a volume for children that’s half novel, half picture book. The film is ostensibly aimed at a family audience, too, but its bloated 127-minute running time means that few children will have the patience to sit through the whole thing. And it turns out that the main purpose of this fantasy is to argue for the importance of film preservation — director Martin Scorsese founded the Film Foundation, which is dedicated to just that.
So while “Hugo” is beautifully made, its self-indulgence means it’s not quite satisfying. It can’t be counted a modern classic like so many of Scorsese’s other films. But it’s a charming flight of fancy, if not for children, then for their parents who are still young at heart.
| On screen |
| ‘Hugo’ |
| 3 out of 4 stars |
| Stars: Asa Butterfield, Chloe Grace Moretz, Ben Kingsley |
| Director: Martin Scorsese |
| Rated: PG for mild thematic material, some action/peril and smoking |
| Running time: 127 minutes |
Asa Butterfield, the young British actor who was so moving in “The Boy in the Striped Pajamas,” stars as the title character, an orphan who lives in the secret pathways of a Paris train station. Born to a family of clockmakers, he keeps the station’s clocks running on time, though the station inspector (a typically amusing performance by Sacha Baron Cohen) has no idea it’s a child who’s doing the work. Hugo meets Georges (Ben Kingsley), the man who runs the station’s toy shop, when the man catches him stealing parts. He has no idea why the boy has need of such things. Hugo is secretive, working to fix the automaton left to him by his father in private. It’s a desperate job: Hugo hopes that the robot, once working, will give him a message from his beloved papa.
But there’s more to Georges, strangely grim for a toy shop owner, than meets the eye. Hugo and Georges will learn they have an important connection, thanks to Georges’ ward, Isabelle (Chloe Grace Moretz). Hugo wonders why this pretty girl offers to help him. “Because this might be an adventure,” she responds. “And I’ve never had one before.”
Thus begins a children’s fantasy that takes the pair to, of all places, a library of film studies. I told you this was a strange film.
A great deal of the film’s interest comes from its star. Butterfield’s striking blue eyes are enough to keep ours on the screen. Moretz has helped carry a film before, too: She was the vampire in the English-language remake “Let Me In.” The American actress can do accents, too, as she proves with this mostly English cast, including Helen McCrory as Georges’ wife and Emily Mortimer as the lovely flower seller who’s the object of the station inspector’s shy attentions.
“Come and dream with me,” the filmmaker, finally revealed toward the end of the film, invites his audience. This director was a real man, and Scorsese must have had fun re-creating some of his iconic images — and in 3D, no less. The 3D here is a bit different from what we’re used to. It doesn’t bring us in to the world of the movie so much as it creates a whole new world, a steampunk Paris that’s more fantasy than reality. It’s fitting, though, in a film about film, and the visionaries who hope to take their dreams and make them real to a credulous audience.
