Hugo

Laurel and I saw Hugo this week--and it was frankly pretty great. I love the book it's based on--The Invention of Hugo Cabret, by Brian Selznick--so much, and I was very nervous about one of my favorite books being made into a movie, but I heard that Selznick was really happy with it, plus it's such a book that's asking to be a movie--it's so visual, and it's so about film. The movie does a lovely job of using footage talked about (and pictured in drawings) in the book, and it makes me happy to have that footage in a movie that people who might not have seen it will see (and those who have seen it will be happy to see it again)--Harold Lloyd hanging from the hands of the clock in Safety Last!--which fits into Hugo in many ways--several clips and references to The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat Station, and plenty of others including lots of Melies. The actors are great, the script is great, of course it's not the same as the book and I'll always love the book, but the movie does a fabulous job of telling the story of the book, but telling it as a movie. If that makes sense. I guess the movie isn't really quite telling the story of the book--it's telling its own story, closely related but well suited to its medium.