Here's the thing about Bob Zemeckis and all his newfangled motion-capture outings. When put to more mythic use in Beowulf, I was more drawn in by the adventure and less distracted by the characters. However, between The Polar Express and A Christmas Carol, I couldn't help but be re-struck time and time again but that unfortunate uncanny valley, especially when the characters look so much like the real thing (see: Gary Oldman as Cratchit) that I'd just as soon watch them give live-action performances that would then go surrounded by countless effects (you know, the way they used to make movies).That disappointing truth, combined with last weekend's good-not-great opening for Carol, isn't getting Zemeckis down, though. According to Pajiba, he's pursuing The Nutcracker as his next holiday adaptation to be 'enhanced' by mo-cap technology. (I think it's fairly safe to assume after Carol and Express that this will likely end up in 3-D as well.) The site says that he'll be working from E.T.A. Hoffman's original novel over the Tchaikovsky ballet, "a period piece, set in 19th century Russia, which will explore how the cursed Nutcracker character came to be and the battle between the dolls and the mice."
Well, that shows how much I remember of the original tale (a war between dolls and mice?). Personally, I just want this one to go on the busy man's back burner if it means getting that Roger Rabbit sequel done sooner. At least the bunny doesn't creep me out with his lifeless eyes...
1. I don't understand the appeal of motion capture movies or why Zemeckis is concentrating on making only movies based around it. It's a new technology, OK, but it's just an updated version of rotoscoping really. How well did that go?
I'm not trying to criticize him, I just don't get it. Seeing computer graphics with motion capture is just so unsettling. Giving something which is by nature unnatural realistic movements is, to me, creepy to watch.
If he was doing like what Pixar is doing, creating 100% digital environments and giving life to something which only exists in a computer, then OK, there is something unique about that. But just going and putting computer graphics over human performances, what's the point? Like I said I am not trying to criticize him, I just do not understand the appeal.
I also do not agree with Zemeckis when he says that he did A Christmas Carol because it was not until recently that the technology existed to make a movie based on the book that was true how it was written.
Maybe I'm not understanding what he means, but why is motion capture necessary to make this movie? Special effects are not good enough to make a live action version that would be faithful to the visuals as described in the book? Speilberg or Tim Burton couldn't pull that off? Or a 100% computer animated version couldn't be made by someone like Pixar or Dreamworks? Like I said maybe I'm just misunderstanding what he meant.
Can someone help explain all this to a brother?
Posted at 10:31PM on Nov 11th 2009 by Booby Jones