Good but not excellent

Rating: 7/10 (26 February 2012)

Meant to be visually stunning, it fell a little short to my expectations. The visual effects may fool the children, but at some point they will get annoying. When Hugo is within the walls of the train station you will notice that his movements do not fit the constraints of the architecture as you saw it in the interior of the station. The train station and the space between the walls are obviously different worlds. Another flaw is that there are several shots which would have the camera position as much as three times as high as the Eiffel tower. There is no such tall building in the vicinity of the Eiffel tower in my recollection of Paris, especially not in the time in which the movie is set. I also noticed I got a little bored with the 'steampunk' clockworks and machinery that you see in this movie, the golden compass and likes.
I enjoyed the wild experiments of the beginning of film making, in which the main character George Melies plays a big role. You feel the excitement of new inventions and wonders of technology. But I fear that this movie suffers too much from lack of focus; children will miss the different layers and will probably be bored and the storytelling will leave adults something to wish for.