Catch The Magical ‘Polar Express,’ One Way Or Another

I have long been a proponent of seeing movies the way they are meant to be seen, whether it be in a large-screen movie house or well-maintained, stadium-seating multiplex. If the filmmakers went to the trouble of making a big-screen movie, then it should be first seen on the big screen, or, at the very least, if you’re talking about home viewing, watched on a wide-screen format DVD.

That being said, I believe this is the very first column where I propose that a movie should only be seen on the big, big screen in Imax...and only in 3D!

The movie in question is The Polar Express, which, as of last week, was among the top five most popular films in the country and was closing in on the $100 million mark at the box office.

Young and old booklovers alike have long known about the holiday magic of the 1985 Caldecott medal-winning children’s book, written by Chris Van Allsburg, on which the film is based. It tells of a young boy whose waning faith in Santa Claus is revived when he makes a fantastic journey to the North Pole via a special locomotive, the Polar Express.

What many of those same readers are probably wondering is how could the filmmakers take the book’s barely 30-pages long narrative and turn it into a viable feature-length movie that doesn’t betray Van Allsburg’s delicate, memorable work? Good question indeed.

Warner Bros. answered by calling upon one of America’s most popular actors, Tom Hanks (who better to instill holiday cheer and good will when you need it?), and re-teaming him with his director from Cast Away and Forrest Gump, Robert Zemeckis.

You might think that Hanks, who plays multiple characters in the film (including a colorful conductor, a mysterious hobo, and the big, jolly man himself), is the MVP of this production, but I would argue that Zemeckis is the key player here.

In an attempt to grasp the emotion and mood of Van Allsburg’s beloved book, his movie debuts a new Computer Generated Image (CGI) technique called “performance capture.”

Who better to helm such an enterprising endeavor than the director of such technologically savvy films as Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Back to the Future, Death Becomes Her, and the aforementioned Forrest Gump.

By the performance capture method Zemeckis employs here, all actions performed by a human being in the film were  actually performed by a human being on a soundstage.

There was no animation involved this time around, only what is called digital rendering. It was hoped that this new technology would allow the characters in the film to convey some of the subtleties of human expression that often elude typical CGI creations.

It’s not entirely successful. In fact, some viewers have suggested the characters looked eerily creepy.

But I would argue the performance intricacies this technique transmits are much better seen on the Imax big screen. But even better communicated in the 3D medium is the style Zemeckis utilizes to adapt the book by taking its barely 30 pages long narrative and turning it into a more thrilling train-ride adventure story that includes daring, narrow escapes (the steam train’s jaunt over a frozen lake is a highlight), sweeping visual vistas and subtle animation touches (catch a snowman’s oven mitt gloves waving goodbye in the winter wind).

Many of these touches come across rather flatly in the regular film, but their beauty is unleashed when viewed as The Polar Express: An Imax 3D Experience.

My recommendation is this: If you can find The Polar Express, rated G for all audiences (but some scenes of jeopardy and mildly intense action scenes might be too much for the youngest ones), in Imax 3D, take advantage of that opportunity and enjoy the ride for the holidays.

Otherwise, wait for the DVD next holiday season and hope that it comes out in a 3D version you can enjoy at home.