By Ashley E. Lang
Filmmaker Georges Méliès revolutionized cinema in the late 1800s using a variety of special effects to illuminate the screen. His illusions mesmerized audiences across Europe and now with the release of Hugo, Méliès is not soon to be forgotten.
Academy Award winning director Martin Scorsese truly outdoes himself with Hugo. Set in 1930s Paris, Hugo tells the story of an orphaned boy, Hugo Cabret, played by Asa Butterfield, who lives in the walls of a train station tending to the towering clocks. His father, played by Jude Law, dies tragically and Hugo’s drunken Uncle Claude, played by Ray Winstone, takes him in as an apprentice before disappearing. Left to fend for himself, Hugo steals just enough to get him by. That is, until he steals one too many times from a local vender.
Georges Méliès, played by Ben Kingsley, spends his days tinkering with toys at a little shop inside the train station. After noticing his toys go missing, he cunningly sets up Hugo, who falls straight into his trap. However, Méliès and Hugo share much more than a few stolen nuts and bolts. What develops in an unlikely friendship, one fused together with the addition of Méliès’s goddaughter Isabelle, played by Chloe Grace Moretz.
Isabelle quickly befriends Hugo and the two set off on an adventure to solve a mystery that has been plaguing him since before the death of his father. Hugo’s dad discovered an automaton, a self-operating machine, stored away inside the museum he worked for. Broken and hidden, Hugo’s father takes the automaton home and with Hugo’s help begins to restore the antique. When his father passes away, Hugo begins where his father left off. But the closer he gets to fixing the broken machine, the more questions and mysteries that surface. Why does Isabelle’s necklace hold the key to the machine’s revival and what connection does the automaton have to Méliès?
Hugo is a beautifully written story of an orphaned boy who sets out to find his place in the world, only to help those around him find theirs. What unravels is a masterful and intelligent plot that will captivate audiences both young and old.
Butterfield captures Hugo Cabret with precision. He will melt your heart from the first tear to the final smile. Butterfield brings Hugo to life with his sense of adventure and determination and his character is downright captivating. Kingsley’s superb portrayal of cold hearted and seemingly broken Méliès and Moretz’s inquisitive nature transverse Hugo to a whole new plateau and all three breathe life into Scorsese’s vision.
With the addition of Sasha Baron Cohen as the station inspector whose own loneliness masquerades as ruthlessness, in an intense role for the first time since the funny man catapulted himself into the industry as Borat, make Hugo a must see this holiday season.
Scorsese’s latest film shines beyond measure. An inspirational journey of discovery, Hugo will entrance you as you watch the plot unfold. Scorsese has done it again. Do I foresee another Academy Award? I sure hope so, because he certainly deserves it.
