Thursday, December 23, 2010

Movie Review - The Polar Express

by Alex Popp



Don't miss the holiday film of the season, "The Polar Express," directed by Robert Zemeckis.

Tom Hanks voices five characters in this brilliantly animated movie, based on the book by Chris Van Allsburg. I always loved trains when I was a little kid and I got the book when I was 6. You can bet I was really excited to see the movie in theaters.

An pre-teenager who is losing belief in Santa Claus gets a ticket to ride on the magical steam train, The Polar Express. The boy steps on to the train on its way to the North Pole and meets up with several other non-believers. On the way, the boy goes through a lot of intense action, riding up and down roller coaster-like mountains, sliding over the ice cap and getting off the top of the train before it hits a low-clearance tunnel.

I saw it when I was 10 and I am still very impressed with this piece of art. They stuck very well with the book (beside the things they added in to make it a movie). The animation is incredible, even better than the animation of other movies like the Pixar films. The sound is so well designed and the action is so supenseful, it is impossible not to enjoy the movie, even if you aren't still a believer in fantasy. Though the movie isn't in theaters anymore, the 3D effects are almost overwhelming, too. I loved the movie so much, I saw it two more times in theaters.

Rated G, but probably should be PG for sequences of intense action.

Four stars (out of four) for the dazzling Holiday flick, "The Polar Express."

Review by Alex Popp for The Animation Empire blog.

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Whenever I read "Don't miss the holiday film of the season" I can't help but think "the 2004 holiday season," because just "season" isn't accurate enough for me. It sounds recent. =^)

- The Emperor

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