When I was a little boy,there were rag dolls
This Tintin was neither Jean-Pierre Talbot nor Jamie Bell;no cartoons either ,no color ,I think that the first user saw another version.
This is 1947 and it is the first attempt at an animated film starring Tintin;coincidence:it was based on "Le Crabe Aux Pinces D'or ,large bits of which Spielberg used for his own Tintin.A shoestring budget ,a short length (about 55 min) a shady producer (the writer tried to attract Disney's attention,to no avail;his works were returned to the sender).The movie was shown on December,the 21st 1947,in the presence of Hergé in Bruxelles;it was a short-lived success.It was its only day in the theater;the next day ,the movie was seized ,to soak up the shady producer's debts;the crook had flown to South America.Nothing was heard of the movie since,though it was talked about in Hergé's biopics on TV in the nineties.Finally it was released on DVD ;to clear up any misunderstanding,the cover shows Tintin,Milou and the Dupondt twins in front of a garbage can.
Now for the movie :it's an animated movie with rag dolls ,in the tradition of the genre masterpiece "Le Roman De Renart" ;it is faithful to the story as a dog;only two important scenes are missing:the attack in the desert and Haddock's final and unfortunate lecture on alcohol,probably because the team was running out of money.Tintin speaks in a thin voice ,but Haddock's swears are here and the Dupondt's gaffes are not forgotten (their discreet investigation).The visions in the desert are kept (the hero being taken for a bottle of champagne);even the two nightmares are smartly introduced :on the life boat ,Tintin sleeps in a doll's bed while the captain lights a fire with the oars -in the cartoon book ,he was at the window of a house in flames -;even better is the dream in the small fort: the artists go out of their way to create a surrealist feeling (see "spellbound" two years before)a la Dali.
It's a long way from "Le Crabe Aux Pinces D'or " to "the adventures of Tintin:the secret of the Unicorn".
This is 1947 and it is the first attempt at an animated film starring Tintin;coincidence:it was based on "Le Crabe Aux Pinces D'or ,large bits of which Spielberg used for his own Tintin.A shoestring budget ,a short length (about 55 min) a shady producer (the writer tried to attract Disney's attention,to no avail;his works were returned to the sender).The movie was shown on December,the 21st 1947,in the presence of Hergé in Bruxelles;it was a short-lived success.It was its only day in the theater;the next day ,the movie was seized ,to soak up the shady producer's debts;the crook had flown to South America.Nothing was heard of the movie since,though it was talked about in Hergé's biopics on TV in the nineties.Finally it was released on DVD ;to clear up any misunderstanding,the cover shows Tintin,Milou and the Dupondt twins in front of a garbage can.
Now for the movie :it's an animated movie with rag dolls ,in the tradition of the genre masterpiece "Le Roman De Renart" ;it is faithful to the story as a dog;only two important scenes are missing:the attack in the desert and Haddock's final and unfortunate lecture on alcohol,probably because the team was running out of money.Tintin speaks in a thin voice ,but Haddock's swears are here and the Dupondt's gaffes are not forgotten (their discreet investigation).The visions in the desert are kept (the hero being taken for a bottle of champagne);even the two nightmares are smartly introduced :on the life boat ,Tintin sleeps in a doll's bed while the captain lights a fire with the oars -in the cartoon book ,he was at the window of a house in flames -;even better is the dream in the small fort: the artists go out of their way to create a surrealist feeling (see "spellbound" two years before)a la Dali.
It's a long way from "Le Crabe Aux Pinces D'or " to "the adventures of Tintin:the secret of the Unicorn".
- dbdumonteil
- Nov 21, 2011