The Polar Express Review

by Laura Clifford (laura AT reelingreviews DOT com)
November 13th, 2004
THE POLAR EXPRESS
-----------------

A young boy grows suspicious about the existence of a Santa Claus even his little sister questions as needing to be able to travel at the speed of light with a sleigh the size of an ocean liner. Restless on Christmas Eve, the boy feigns sleep when his parents come in to check on him. 'An express train wouldn't wake him up,' dad whispers as they leave his room, but moments later the child witnesses the arrival outside his very door of "The Polar Express."
Producer/Writer/Director Robert Zemeckis ("Who Framed Roger Rabbit?," "Forrest Gump") brings the technologically ballyhooed adaptation of Chris Van Allsburg's twenty year old children's book to the screen with Oscar winner Tom Hanks featured in five motion-captured performances, but this train never quite leaves the station. The animation style, which has been featured almost exclusively in video game creation, renders humans almost real but for their flat, unsparkling eyes, amidst the softly lighted backgrounds of a Thomas Kinkade painting. The 32 page book has been stretched into a feature with repetition (numerous roller coaster effects, a ticket wafting into the air not once, but twice) and the introduction of extraneous characters ('The Hobo'). Its single best scene, where an Express ticket takes an airborne journey aided by the rush of a wolf pack and the flight of a bald eagle, comes courtesy of the vastly superior, similarly themed, thirty minute UK animation, "The Snowman."

The film's look can be astonishing (presumably more so on the IMAX screen), especially in such details as fabric movement, but the filmmakers resistance to rendering the humans too realistically may have hurt the film
- it is only in those few brief moments when the riders of "The Polar Express" do almost look real that one can believe in them. The wolves, eagles and caribou are far more pleasing to the eye than the 'Hero boy,' conductor or cartoonish (and irritating) train engineers Smokey and Steamer (both voiced by the late Michael Jeter). 'Hero Girl' (voiced by Nona Gaye, "The Matrix: Revolutions") resembles an American Girl doll while 'Lonely Boy' (Hank's 'Bosom Buddies' costar Peter Scolari) is an artificial version of "Malcolm in the Middle's" Dewey. Vocal performances are average with the exception of Eddie Deezen's ("Spy Hard") 'Know-It-All-Boy,' although Hanks does succeed in creating five unique voices.

A sense of deja vu sets in immediately with composer Alan Silvestri's music a mushy echo of Elfman's "Edward Scissorhands" score. Songs, beginning with the rousingly animated "Hot Chocolate," are bland.

"The Polar Express" does include some scenes of startling beauty and musters Christmas spirit with its grand climax (again using a device from 1978's "The Snowman"), but the film's predominant inspiration is one of boredom. A quick appearance at film's end by Aerosmith singer Steve Tyler as a rocking elf is grossly out of place.

C-

For more Reeling reviews visit http://www.reelingreviews.com

More on 'The Polar Express'...

---

Originally posted in the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup. Copyright belongs to original author unless otherwise stated. We take no responsibilities nor do we endorse the contents of this review.