![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerFor this week’s Caldecott book, I reread The Invention of Hugo Cabret, which I first read years ago when I was volunteering with my former fifth grade teacher to help with her current class. They were reading the book aloud, and they saved the last chapter especially so I could read it to them.
So I have a certain sentimental attachment to this book, but even without that, it’s really good and also innovative in the way that it weaves together words and pictures. It’s a very thick book, and looks intimidating, but in fact at least half of those pages are pictures - not just illustrations (I mean no disrespect to illustrations), but pictures that carry the narrative in themselves, intercut with sections of regular prose. It’s a different twist on the idea of a graphic novel.
I also really like the art style: black and white sketches, very classy. They suit the subject matter, too: young Hugo lives in a train station in interwar Paris, and becomes embroiled in a mystery that forces him to research the history of early movies and the work of Georges Melies. This is 100% one of those children’s book that is designed to spark an interest in the great cultural touchstones of the past, which is actually something I always enjoy if it’s done well.
Steven Spielberg did a movie version of this book, Hugo, which I thought did not do this very well. The film is too long, and the part about early film especially is too long, and the whole thing feels bloated - which is really too bad, because what better medium to showcase early film than film itself?
***
I must confess I am running out of steam on the Caldecott project, but I am soooo close to done that I might as well finish it. I’ve quite enjoyed many of the books that I’ve read for it, so I’m not sure why I’m tired of it; I think perhaps doing one book a week was a mistake. It’s stretched the project out for going on two years now.
So I have a certain sentimental attachment to this book, but even without that, it’s really good and also innovative in the way that it weaves together words and pictures. It’s a very thick book, and looks intimidating, but in fact at least half of those pages are pictures - not just illustrations (I mean no disrespect to illustrations), but pictures that carry the narrative in themselves, intercut with sections of regular prose. It’s a different twist on the idea of a graphic novel.
I also really like the art style: black and white sketches, very classy. They suit the subject matter, too: young Hugo lives in a train station in interwar Paris, and becomes embroiled in a mystery that forces him to research the history of early movies and the work of Georges Melies. This is 100% one of those children’s book that is designed to spark an interest in the great cultural touchstones of the past, which is actually something I always enjoy if it’s done well.
Steven Spielberg did a movie version of this book, Hugo, which I thought did not do this very well. The film is too long, and the part about early film especially is too long, and the whole thing feels bloated - which is really too bad, because what better medium to showcase early film than film itself?
***
I must confess I am running out of steam on the Caldecott project, but I am soooo close to done that I might as well finish it. I’ve quite enjoyed many of the books that I’ve read for it, so I’m not sure why I’m tired of it; I think perhaps doing one book a week was a mistake. It’s stretched the project out for going on two years now.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-08 06:58 pm (UTC)I'm afraid it was Martin Scorsese, which makes it even more frustrating that it did not work. At this point I expect Spielberg to get anything with a trace of sentiment wrong.
I saw Hugo; I remember enjoying it, thinking of it as very loving toward its early movies, but not thinking it was brilliant and in hindsight mostly caring about Ben Kingsley's Méliès and the romance between Sacha Baron Cohen and Emily Mortimer, which is not what I expect out of a movie with Sacha Baron Cohen in it. Is the film's problem that it wasn't willing to compress anything for the screen, or did it elaborate on the book, or what?
no subject
Date: 2018-01-08 09:56 pm (UTC)The illustrations make the book quite thick, but the story itself is svelte and I think would have made a fine movie adaptation with very few changes (perhaps a little more emphasis on the early film history, just because, after all, it's a movie so you can show it). Scorsese elaborated considerably: the Sacha Baron Cohen/Emily Mortimer romance in particular is entirely a movie invention and annoyed me for that reason. I suppose if you've cast Sacha Baron Cohen you want him to have something to do, though.
Now I kind of want to watch it again. I know a bit more about early film now than I did then, which might make it more enjoyable.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-08 10:05 pm (UTC)I think he got worse. It tends to cluster in his genre fiction; I bounced squashily off A.I. (2001) and War of the Worlds (2005) and even The Terminal (2006), but quite enjoyed Catch Me If You Can (2002) and Munich (2005) is actually—I mean this positively—pretty cold. The Adventures of Tintin (2011) was delightful. I didn't even go near War Horse (2011). I want to see Bridge of Spies (2015) partly because I've had it described to me in terms of John le Carré, which should put an automatic limit on the amount of sentiment even Spielberg can introduce. I am one hundred percent not interested in Ready Player One (2018).
The illustrations make the book quite thick, but the story itself is svelte and I think would have made a fine movie adaptation with very few changes (perhaps a little more emphasis on the early film history, just because, after all, it's a movie so you can show it).
That makes sense. Usually you have to prune when adapting for film; starting with material that fits neatly, it makes less sense to add.
Scorsese elaborated considerably: the Sacha Baron Cohen/Emily Mortimer romance in particular is entirely a movie invention and annoyed me for that reason.
How interesting. It registered so vividly to me, I wonder if Scorsese should just have put it in a movie of its own.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-09 11:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-01-09 11:21 pm (UTC)I can rewatch Jaws (1975). I never want to be in the same room as War of the Worlds again.
(It is true that I have not tested how Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) holds up, because my grandmother loved that movie and I watched it with her and if it has collapsed into a pile of saccharine, I don't want to know. I ignored most of E.T. (1982) when shown it at summer camp and have really never regretted this life decision.)
no subject
Date: 2018-01-09 11:25 pm (UTC)Close Encounters has its beauty, and I loved it when I saw it as a kid, but it irritated me in all the old familiar ways when I saw it as an adult, so yeah: maybe better to pass on a rewatch if you want to keep happy memories. (Though there are still things to like about it, even in my irritation)
ETA: I've never seen Jaws
no subject
Date: 2018-01-09 11:26 pm (UTC)It is terribly, terribly unfair to sharks, but Richard Dreyfuss is wonderful.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-09 10:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-01-09 06:31 am (UTC)I saw Hugo before I read the book and loved it, although I'd agree that the part about early film is overly long.
no subject
Date: 2018-01-09 04:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-01-09 11:01 pm (UTC)Yeah; I can see how it might be wearing to do the project for two years straight. I wonder what you'll do on Mondays when you're done!
no subject
Date: 2018-01-09 11:06 pm (UTC)