An orphan living in the clock tower of a Paris train station seeks to find what he is missing in his life.

Rating: 9/10 (18 December 2014)

It's 1930's Paris in the winter. Smoke puffs out of fireplaces, and the large clock of the train station clicks on. A boy, probably 10 years of age, peeks out of a hole between the 3 and 4 on the clock's face, and he energetically climbs down to the station floor. He steals a piece of bread, and then he sees it. There is an older man sitting at the counter of a small shop, and he's dozing off. The boy sneaks up to the counter, and just as he grasps a mechanical mouse on the counter, the old man's hand descends upon the boy's, and we learn that this is not the first time such an instance has occurred. "What's is your name, thief?" the old man asks. With a sob, the young boy replies, "Hugo Cabret." As the camera follows young Hugo back to his "home", we see that he is a lonely orphan, and his only companion, if one my call it such, is a automaton that is missing a piece from his late father. However, this loneliness all changes when he meets young Isabelle, the goddaughter of the same old man who owns the toyshop. An avid book enthusiast, Isabelle has always wanted to have her own grand adventure, and she seeks to help Hugo not only find the missing piece to his automaton, but the orphan's life as well. Little to the children's knowledge, the automaton will simply be the beginning to the discoveries to come.
Though on the surface this film appears to be a kids' movie about an orphan and his broken automaton, it does not take long for this facade to disperse, and for the real object of interest: the imagination of film. Without giving away any spoilers, the art and magical nature of cinema ends of being a major theme of this film. The story takes us back to the very first films by the Lumiere Brothers in 1895, and it carries us into cinema's deepest roots, back when there were no movie stars, no audible dialogue, and any color was hand-tinted by the director. The art of classic films is explored, and the imaginative nature behind them is displayed for all. In terms of genre, this film was a jump for director Martin Scorsese. As a man whose films usually revolve around the Italian society, primarily the Mob, he has made a few attempts to stray from this preconception, and this is one of his finest in doing so. This film was his first endeavor into completely digital filmmaking, and he brings his signature cinematography to the modern medium. In numerous interviews, Scorsese had said that this was his "love-letter to film." As he made this film, the director takes us into his heart that still beats with the joy that he felt as a young boy when he would go to the cinema. As one may assume, this film received quite a bit of critical acclaim. Though nominated for 9 Oscars, most notably Best Picture, Hugo came home with 5 awards: Cinematography, Art Direction, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, and Visual Effects. I for one believe that this is only of Scorsese's best films from a cinematography standpoint. My few negative points are quite trifling, yet bear with me. I did not like how the setting is Paris, France, and yet the characters all have British accents. I know that this is trivial, but it did catch my attention. Secondly, I did not like how the story only shows Hugo's father for such a short moment, and the father's death is too quickly shown. I understand that the film was made with children as the audience, yet I still feel that they should have lingered a bit longer. Though it is rated PG, and the titular character is a child, this film can apply to nearly anyone. The art of the moving picture has somewhat lost its credibility, and it takes a film like this to remind us of that.
I fully recommend this film to anyone who is a cinefile like myself, and the negative parts are like single frames in the rolls of film that put together this movie.
www.sportsandcelluloid.blogspot.com