Continuing with the theme tonic of movies recommended weekly by the AAA team, today I want to share my critique/review of one of the movies that more than stand out for its history stands out enormously for the revolutionary digital technology and audiovisual used in the era.

Without further ado:

The Polar Express

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As I was telling you at the beginning this movie although it doesn't seem to be too much, it marked a great advance in the development of animation technology, let's remember that this movie was originally released in 2004, a year where nobody thought it was possible to animate a movie entirely using a pixel capture system in which the actors had all the weight of the tape despite being an animated film.

And who else than the avant-garde genius who brought us Back to the future to take care of something so cool and risky. That's how Robert Zemeckis started his creative machine to bring us a Christmas movie that combines a unique story with a revolutionary animation.

As we enter the development of the film that finally is what interests us, Polar Express is basically about the journey of a little boy and his constant goal of finding again the illusion of Christmas. A child who by various factors begins to lose all positive feeling that generates Christmas, that is to say, that he is no longer interested in anything of Christmas, and is rather determined to grow early and take another path. However, destiny has prepared him an adventure towards the North Pole to restore his faith in Christmas.

Many of the main scenes occur in principle in the train where our protagonist is on his way to meet Santa, and it is in those scenes where the animations and angles of recording stand out, with shots so varied that it is obvious that they came out of the mind of a filmmaker as brilliant as Zemeckis. Where he takes full advantage of the capacity of interpretation that gives him the animation in pixels to create all kinds of possible scenes.

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For me, the film is almost a work of art in animation, which after having seen remastered in 4K a couple of years ago confirms me the importance of the work that was achieved at the time.

But this movie not only stands out for the technical, and is that the script also has a great merit for coupling perfectly and for being a funny and entertaining story of a little boy that in a trip without control full of ups and downs, where for many moments we thought it would not be able to get to know Santa, ends up doing it and finally recovering the magic and illusion that represents Christmas. Because after all, that is what this film is all about, to make us go through a perfect audiovisual journey that ends with a clear message so that children do not lose their innocence and on the contrary strengthen it and keep believing in those things that make them happy.

Among the things I liked most about this film is the tone and finesse it had to transmit the message, never stop believing, in that scene of a simple bell and a final scene full of humor and good memories that lead us one last time to know that everything is possible if we believe it is possible.