Hugo

Now, I normally don’t care for 3D films. I find the third dimension to be an unnecessary distraction from the proceedings, an extra bell or whistle added to most action movies to distract the viewer from the inane plot, lousy dialog and poor characterization. But the 3D in Hugo, while still slightly unnecessary for me, did add a certain quality to the layout of scenes. It seemed as if some care and thought had gone in to decide how to use the medium and produce a more integrated result.

But we’re also talking about a film which blares something that for me is an automatic indicator of quality: “Directed by Martin Scorsese.” Scorsese is a virtuoso, a master of his chosen craft, an artiste with an expansive, rich filmic vocabulary. The opening sequence is a cinematic gambit ably done by an auteur working at the top of his game on a story that takes twists and turns that are surprising.

We begin from on high, up in the clouds, and zoom along with a train before the camera becomes the train. We don’t stop the momentum as we zip through the train station, past figures and random passengers, before stopping. We’ve come to our soundstage for most of the film – Gare Montparnasse railway station in Paris. And these early sections are lively, full of fun and mischief as Hugo must escape from the tyrannical Station Inspector, keep the clocks running and find new ways to steal food to survive.

It all sounds a little depressing, and his childhood is very much out of a Charles Dickens novel, but there’s a wandering sense of fun that pervades Asa Butterfield’s performance. He’s a charming little street urchin, a voyeur who views the train station as his own private movie theater, and each section and interaction amongst the employees that he views from afar a different genre. And the first hour or so, maybe a little less, plays out like this.

Then he meets Isabelle (Chloë Grace Moretz, a ridiculously talented actress already), the goddaughter of the man who runs the trinket shop. Their friendship is a meeting of like minds, even if their chosen mediums are different. He, having lost his father at a young age and forcibly become the keeper of the clocks with his drunken uncle, hasn’t had much time to read. But his fondest memories are of the movies. And she is forbidden from seeing movies, but loves to get lost in the new worlds and ideas presented to her in books. They see a similar passion, and there really isn’t much of a difference between being obsessed with the magic of a novel or a book, they each give you something special.

Once we discover the identity of her godfather, and why she is forbidden from watching movies, Hugo takes a dramatic shift. Now it becomes something terribly personal for Scorsese, and here is where he shows his passion. It transitions slowly into the story of one boy who works tirelessly to preserve the legacy of nearly forgotten greats in cinema. He wants to preserve these films and educate the masses on their importance and artistic legacy.

If this sounds familiar, then it should. Hugo becomes Scorsese’s personal manifesto about film preservation, to return spectacle to the cinema, and to make believe in the magic. That isn’t to say it is all pure vanity project, there’s too much warmth, fun and wonderment on display for that.

And Scorsese slowly integrates scenes from real silent films, without having fussed with them or done any digital trickery, I wanted to give a standing ovation. The scenes recreating many of these moments are just as good. Hugo slowly turns from a family film about a street urchin living in a Paris train station into an elaborate love poem to the movies, and all of the creativity and joy they can inspire in people. That a scene, which left me heartbroken as a film lover, where film strips are forever lost, having been melted down to make heels for shoes can transition into one boy rescuing the surviving prints from certain death left me walking out on a natural high. But, then again, every Scorsese movie leaves me walking out like that.

2011 was an interesting year in cinema, in that many of the prime players for the awards season looked back at the history and figures that helped shape American cinema as we know it. We had the great, loveable comedy The Artist, and a flawed film with a stunningly complicated and fully-realized central performance in My Week With Marilyn, and, of course, Hugo which took disparate elements from both, and crafted my personal favorite movie of that year. Funny how these things go in cycles. 2011 was the year in which the movies took a look back at themselves.