Off Somehow

Rating: 7/10 (23 November 2007)

After seeing this movie, I've decided that I'm not really a fan of motion capture animation for a primarily human cast. I didn't think much about it in "The Polar Express", as I assumed the primary reason for it was to attempt to emulate the illustrations of the book it was based on. I also didn't think about it much in movies like "Monster House" and "Happy Feet", as the characters were cartoons for all intents and purposes. In "Beowulf", however, I believe the use of motion capture animation caused us to lose some of the human expression that may have really helped this feature to rise to the next level. While it was fantastic in some scenes, and especially in some shots of the movie (there were extreme closeups that never could have been done with a live camera), other scenes fell short where they should not have. My new opinion of this new technology is that it should be used to enhance film-making, rather than create it's own genre. For instance, if we were to perfect this new technology, we could create and use those shots that could not be done with a live action camera in a primarily live action movie (most illustrative point is Gollum). Having said all that, I thought the story was very well put together and not at all disjointed, as so many movies lately have been. The voice work was almost all superb, and the animated surroundings of the characters were beautiful. It's really too bad that it's so difficult to connect with characters that just don't feel human enough.