It’s that time of year again–the malls start to get crowded, folks begins to decorate their homes, and the TVs are full of specials and more specials. Many of these programs cover the basic ‘discovering the meaning of the holiday season’ bit. Despite it’s innovative look, “”The Polar Express””, the newest film from director Robert Zemeckis, appears to be one of these TV specials…only on the big screen.
The movie is like this old-time Christmas entertainment in that the story has been essentially covered before—the whole disbelieving in holiday spirit–or in this case Santa Claus–thing. The protagonist is led on a trip with an expected revelation. Many of the elements are familiar–the ‘Scrooge’ theme, learning to trust others–done with admittedly well-done special effects.About those effects…they do look impressive, from the realistic looking hair, to the birthmark on a character’s cheek, to the back drop as the namesake train travels through the mountains and over an icy lake. Without delving into the whole process, the animated figures seen in the flick have genuine movement, thanks to their following the motions of real actors. Hopefully, this type of CGI can be viewed in future films.The plot concerns the moment when a young boy (Tom Hanks/voice of Daryl Sabara of “”Spy Kids”” fame) begins to change–no, no, nothing like that, anyway the lead starts to doubt whether Kris Kringle, or simply the great bearded one, exists. He tries to persuade others, include his younger sister Sarah (Leslie Harter Zemeckis, the filmmaker’s wife–she also voices the kids’ mother/Isabella Peregrina), about this point. Subsequently, on Christmas Eve, an old-style locomotive pulls up to the protagonist’s house, this being the one and only Polar Express (or PE for short), and the conductor (Hanks in one of many vocal roles here) suggests that our lead board. After hesitating, during which the train begins to pull away, the lead character runs and hops on one of the cars. Upon arriving inside, he finds the place full of kids, and makes friends with a girl (Nona M. Gaye), and in turn the two later befriend Billy (Hanks’ “”Bosom Buddies”” co-star Peter Scolari/Jimmy Bennett), who hails from the other side of the tracks and prefers to keep to himself. This mode of transport is designed for the skeptical kids, and is now headed for the North Pole, evidently to meet with Santa.[pagebreak]Since this premise only covers so much, the movie has the leads go through various misadventures, such as the main kid stopping the train to allow Billy on, then losing his female friend’s golden ride ticket (shades of “”Willy Wonka””)–which travels all over through forests, a bird’s nest, and back again–and trying to prevent catastrophe when the brakes fail and everyone heads speedily toward Glacier Gulch (one of the moments in the film that would seem to inspire future amusement park rides). When the passengers finally get to the North Pole, the main players continue their escapades, falling through a toy factory, then being hoisted up by twin blimps only to fall into the town square. At various points, the hero of the story receives assistance from a mysterious hobo (Hanks), who brings up the central theme of ‘believing’.The film has an interesting enough central premise–the whole belief thing–but pads on misadventures which try to keep the viewer entertained but do little to add to the plot. The last few minutes are better, when the flick gets back to its original focus, but the whole ride–literally–could have been shorter. The characters are not that exciting–the stock disbelieving kid, the confident leader, the quiet one who needs to learn to trust others, the mysterious helper–with the exception of the ‘know it all’ kid (uber-nerd Eddie Deezen) who spouts details on everything from hot chocolate to the time.Hanks does fair enough for his roles, especially the conductor and the hobo, and provides the ‘acting’ for the main kid–basically providing the template for the body movements, while Sabara does the voice. Other characters have this situation, where one person provides the body and another the voice.Anyway…the biggest problem for “”The Polar Express”” is that so many great animated films have been done over the last few years, that this can’t seem to match up. It takes more than good CGI; an engrossing story/plot, one that appeals to both children ‘and’ adults, are what many of these other movies have, and what “”Polar Express”” lacks. This is, at its heart, an old movie, one somewhat out of date and out of touch (save for having an African-American girl as one of the leads, a Steven Tyler-look alike elf performing a song late in the film, and another elf saying the word ‘meshugganah’–well now!!!), and even feature some cheesy musical numbers.Other than its innovate look–again, really great to look at–this flick lacks much in the way of substance. While one may not expect much depth in works from Zemeckis, he can certainly do better. The little kids might enjoy this one, but anyone older would be best off sticking to other recent CGI-animated works.Grade: CEM Reviewby Andrew Haas11/10/04