Dupond & Dupont, not Thomson & Thompson

Rating: 7/10 (31 October 2011)

Warning - some light spoils - As an early reader, in my young age, of the whole collection "The Adventures of Tintin", I took great interest in Peter Jackson & Steven Spielberg's handing on this monument of European & world culture.
Needless to say, the graphics deliver here some tremendous effort, the kind of which everybody could bow to...
... But, but, but.
Tintin was not, and was never to be a real young man that Hergé could meet in a Brussels square and take as a subject for a portrait. Tintin WAS Hergé, an idealized expansion of his will to meet the world and solve any of the problems he meets there, so little or so huge they could be.
That's the only way Tintin is : solving, solving, solving everything everywhere to save the day, his life or the world occasionally. Never has he be an antiques seeker with a whip in his hand or in his head. And he just was here BEFORE Indiana Roller-coaster Jones. Here, in Europe, the real Europe, or elsewhere in the world, the real world, the world before, during and after WWII.
What is really fascinating about the whole serial albums of Tintin, is the way it deals with great international affairs of its time : as close as possible with the Great Story, as clear as possible to be understood by young readers, and as subtle as possible not to hurt, not to expose them.
It began in 1930 with Russian soviet-ism, then animal hunt and colonialism in Africa in 1931, then US gangsterism in 1932, then Egyptology and opium traffic in British colonies of Near East 1933-34, then Chinese-Japanese relations in 1936, then the Chaco War in south America in 1937, then counterfeit money in Scotland in 1938, then political plot in central Europe in 1940, then opium traffic again between western Europe and Morocco in 1941, then a competition between scientific teams seeking for a mysterious island where... giant mushrooms grew in 1942, then a domestic affair involving antique dealers stealing antiques in 1943, then a submarine tool to seek a sunken boat in 1944, then a mysterious curse driving scientists into a mad suffering illness in 1948, then a solitary expedition in the mountains to try and cure the curse in 1949, then some oil war in Arabia, then a secret scientific missile project sent to the moon in 1953-54, then the search of a sonic weapon of mass destruction in eastern Europe in 1956, then some slave traffic in Indian ocean in 1958, then the loss of a Chinese friend in Tibet/China in 1960, then a very tiny domestic mystery in 1963, then some air hijacking in the Pacific Ocean in 1968, then some revolutionary war in South America in 1976, then some traffic about modern art in 1986, alas unachieved.
All of these where carrying subtle connections with the harsh world and the pleasure is to find them, and remember them.
Does it allow to be puzzled all the way ? I don't think so and it certainly happened.
For example, the villain in "Le Crabe aux Pinces d'Or" (The Crab with Golden Claws) was lieutenant Allan Thompson, dealing with opium traffic in the Cargo Karaboudjan, but that we hardly see in Spielberg's film ; Allan Thompson was obviously an American trafficker. So, guess, why did Anglo-Saxon translators of Tintin call the Dupondt policemen 'Thompson', and hide Allan, without even mentioning his name, behind some guy named Ivanovitch Sakharine ? hmm ? So with the villains in the Album "Le Secret de la Licorne". They where the Loiseau Brothers, stealing antiques, detaining and chasing Tintin in a castle they were being occupying for two years, as were the Nazi Germans occupying castles all around Europe and... stealing art everywhere, kidnapping and detaining people to ask them informations. Loiseau means "The Bird", as the German emblem was an eagle. But we don't see the Loiseau Brothers at all (except on a tiny picture in the market place) in Spielberg's movie.
So, apart from breathtakingness, can we say this is faithfulness ? No we surely can't. Not only something is gone, but something of the real Tintin is kinda kidnapped.
But Tintin, as we know him, has always been able to escape from kidnappers.