Great film thats not very good.

Rating: 4/10 (16 April 2012)

The hard to fathom title is exactly how I felt about this film. On one had it had good humour, pleasant effects, a good story and lots of action. On the other hand it had too much silly action, the story got to the conclusion in a hap hazard way and after the scene was set, the effects to often felt like a bit of an excuse to have wildly unrealistic action scenes.
Things were going very nicely for the first 20min. The story is set with intrigue surrounding a mysterious model ship that a lot of people seem to be very interested in. Tintin finds this ship in his possession and after a man is shot trying to warn him of the dangers involved with those who possess it, I was sucked in wanting to know what is so special and who are the people that want it so badly. The ship is then stolen during a break in but a clue is left in Tintins apartment. After some investigation and introductions of other characters Tintin gets kidnapped and locked up on a ship. He manages to escape from his guards and ends up meeting the interesting and funny drunk that is captain Haddok.
So far so good I thought. We had some interesting characters, some investigation work, a bit of action and the start of a mysterious story that could lead to anywhere.
This is where things started to go downhill. Haddok and Tintin escape the ship and manage to steal a plane from their former captors. Que the unneeded ridiculous action. The plane runs out of fuel mid flight and the only thing to do is to get Haddok to climb out to the fuel tank and pour some medical spirit in to it. Needless to say it doesn't work and they crash land. Don't worry though everyone survives, including Cpt Haddok who was riding on the front of plane. From this point on, the action snowballs in to a big ball of silliness that I found too much and really quite boring.
This film could have been brilliant if it had stuck to the same pace as the first part but instead it shoved too much craziness in when it just needed to take a break and remember that the main character is great at solving puzzles. Think Indiana Jones and the crystal skull if George Lucas had made the whole thing from animation.