CGI-Sore
Monday, November 17, 2003I just finished watching the trailer for The Polar Express, the new Robert Zemeckis/Tom Hanks movie.
Um, so it’s animated?
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again—if you’re going to use CGI to create photorealistic animation, what’s the point? If you want it to look completely realistic, then use a camera!
What’s worse is that Tom Hanks’s character is just a CGI Tom Hanks. Sure, it looks good, I guess. For a minute there I thought it actually was Tom Hanks behind a soft focus lense, until, of course, he opened his mouth and gave way to the telltale sign of a CGI human: stiff, unrealistic lipsynch.
It’s like watching a Tom Hanks puppet.
I’m sure proponents of the film will try to explain that it’s more than just animation—that it’s probably the result of a rigorous combination of motion capture and acting like Gollum’s character in the Lord of the Rings movies, but like I said—if you can actually film Tom Hanks, what’s the point?
Zombie Claire says:
I guess they are trying to capture the art design from the book, which was semi-realistic but fuzzed up with pastels… the illustrations I mean.
-----
Zombie Claire says:
Why build a CGI Tom Hanks when you could put that effort into a CGI hottie like Gael Garcia????
Zombie Claire says:
Or “CARL” the impossibly beautiful graphic designer from Love, Actually.
Zombie Claire says:
OR JAMES D’ARCY our newest Brit hottie and minor star of Master and Commander & Tom Jones.
Why won’t hollywood accomodate my simple requests???
Zombie Claire says:
HOLY SHIT it just occurred to me all the Trojan hotties that a CGI program could create for TROY, and they’d fight really good too like the orcs in LOTR.
DAMN MY THOUGHTS ARE EXCELLENT REGARDING HOTTIES.
Robot Johnny says:
You know, the last thing we need is to have a digital Tom Hanks on file so that when he dies we can enjoy countless new heart-breaking movies.
Zombie Claire says:
He’s useless without his CGI Meg Ryan counterpart!
Robot Johnny says:
Thanks, Claire, now all the sickos googling for “CGI Meg Ryan” will end up here!
Zombie Claire says:
BLOW JOBS !!! MEG RYAN NUDE !!! BLOW JOBS !!!
kevin says:
huh. huh. huh. CGI girls.
is this club exclusively for Zombie Claire and Robot Johnny or can anyone join?
Zombie Claire says:
JUMP IN, WE’RE MAKING ROOM IN THE JACUZZI!!
kartooner says:
I look forward to this, but I was surprised (like you I suppose) that this movie is CGI. It’s beyond me why they would spend double the production costs for “realistic” computer animation when they could have just as easily combined live-action with CG effects (a la Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings).
Imagine if Peter Jackson (3-4 years ago) decided he was going to do LOTR with CGI. Granted, he uses Gollum (with the help of actor Andy Serkis).
I read that Polar Express uses live-action reference inputed into the computer which translates into the CG models providing fluid animation, etc.
Again, why not do a hybrid CG Live-action film? Who knows?
kartooner says:
Er, to correct the post above (or a portion of it)…
Imagine if Peter Jackson (3-4 years ago) decided he was going to do LOTR *entirely in* CGI.
Steph says:
Oh, no! How could they do this? The Polar Express is one of the most beautifully illustrated children’s books of all time! The guy who did it, Chris Van Allsburg, is the same man famous for creating Jumanji. The book is magic in itself. Tom Hanks?? I like the guy, but he wasn’t exactly in the story I grew up with.