Looks great but that's it

Rating: 1/10 (21 January 2012)

Story that takes place in the 1920s. An orphan named Hugo (Asa Butterfield) lives in a huge Paris terminal making sure all the clocks run correctly. He gets involved in a mystery involving his dead father (Jude Law), a mechanical figure and the mysterious Georges Melies (Ben Kingsley).
The first film directed by Martin Scorsese for a family audience. Too bad it's so terrible. It's boring (I considered leaving a few times), heavy handed, simplistic and slow. The plot is virtually nonexistent and the coincidences that occurred were WAY too hard to believe. Plenty of plot loopholes too. To make matters worse we have a station inspector (Sacha Baron Cohen) who (I suppose) is supposed to be funny but just comes across as annoying. On the plus side it LOOKED great (the station and overviews of Paris in the 1930s are astonishing) and this movies uses 3D better than any other movie I've seen. It also has a message that books are great and movies are magic--two VERY positive messages for any child to hear. An extra bonus is seeing the actual films of Georges Melies on a big screen in great condition with the hand colored frames of the originals. The acting was OK and it was a treat to see Christopher Lee in a small role. But, all in all, I found this pointless and boring. It's only being praised to the high heavens because Scorsese did it. A 1 all the way.