Thoroughly Enjoyable

Rating: 8/10 (26 November 2005)

A young boy who doubts the existence of Santa Claus hears a noise outside his window on Christmas Eve and rides the Polar Express to the North Pole.
I waited for this movie just as I waited for Santa Claus when I was younger: full of anticipation. It did not disappoint. There is a new genre out there making humans look like cartoon characters, or making cartoon characters look like humans and I cannot figure out which is which, or the name for this new genre, but it works. Thoroughly enjoyable.
The photography or cinematography was nothing short of spectacular. I will admit sometimes it looked like Kaleidoscope magic, but it worked. There were only two things that I would have changed to make it better (of course). One: there was too much hesitancy when a child character would speak sometimes. I felt like the character was waiting for someone to give him/her the lines to speak. And, second, I would have given this more music. Oh, there was music and for a minute I thought this might be a musical and maybe in some ways it was, sort of, but there needed to be more of it and more upfront with it. You know, really ring it in. You betcha! In the second half the music was muted in the background. I heard Bing Crosby and others, but I kept waiting to hear Dean Martin too, but never did hear him.
Now, this has the feel of a nice family movie, but I would be careful letting really young children see it because there are some scary scenes when the Polar Express goes off the tracks and LOOK OUT! Get it? Now, if the child is used to playing intense sock'em video games then okay. They won't be too shocked with this. Otherwise