Coluna Claquete – February, 24th 2012

For those who hate Carnival, like me, the programming of theaters proved to be an excellent alternative, thanks to a variety of interesting titles to check. One in particular touched me more deeply, because it talked about the history of my great passion, the movies. The film in question is “Hugo”, directed by Martin Scorsese.

The synopsis did not report much about the movie, and even the trailer seemed to be just a fantasy involving an orphan boy and a robot, So, I was a little surprised to discover that the main theme of the film is the man who gave to the movies its entertainment function, as we know today.

The film’s story is shown through the lens of Hugo Cabret (Asa Butterfield), a young orphan, son of a dedicated watchmaker (Jude Law), killed in an explosion in a museum. Hugo is sheltered by his uncle, Claude (Ray Winstone), who lived permanently drunk, and whose job was taking care of all the clocks in a train station. Hugo was trained by his uncle to replace him in his duties, and in his drunkenness, he simply disappeared from the map.

Hugo had a secret desire, which was put into operation a half-destroyed old automaton that his father picked up the trash of a museum. The two were engaged for countless hours, studying and rebuilding the parts, until the death of his father left the boy alone.

While stealing food to survive, Hugo also stole parts from a store of tricks and toys maintained by the grumpy Georges (Ben Kingsley). In one of these times, Hugo was caught by Georges, which threatened to deliver him to the rigorous Station Inspector (Sacha Baron Cohen).

Hugo met Isabelle (Chloë Grace Moretz), who he imagined to be the granddaughter of George, but discovers that he and his wife are the godfathers of the girl, who was adopted when their parents died in an accident.

Isabelle brings the missing piece to the automaton to function, a heart-shaped key. But the result of this return to life seems to be something even stranger, as it brings the design of a bullet entering the eye of a stylized moon.

In seeking more information on the subject, the young couple discovered that the mysterious godfather of Isabelle was none other than the famous Georges Méliès, a movird enthusiast in its start, and who apparently had died during the First World War.

There is no doubt that the brothers Auguste and Louis Lumière were the inventors of cinema, in its conception of continuous pictures, displayed at a speed that the viewer has the illusion of moving images. In 1895 the brothers exhibited the short movie “Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory” to the Societé d’Encouragement pour l’Industrie Nationale in March, and, in December 28, they organized the first exhibition of films to a paying audience in Paris .

But even the Lumière believed that his invention would be no more than a passing curiosity. Businessmen, even when they saw the public interest, devoted themselves more to cover events and exotic locales, a line that, in the future would led to the cinenews.

Other people, however, coming from vaudeville, realized the fabulous potential of cinema for entertainment. One of these was Georges Méliès, who came from a successful career on stage, and even has his own theater, Théâtre Robert-Houdin in Paris, which had belonged to the famous Houdin, where numerous tricks were displayed using the fruits of his prodigious skill.

When Méliès saw one of the Lumière’s presentations, he became fascinated with the possibilities it could bring to the world of entertainment. But, when he tried to buy one of the cameras from the Lumiéres, had rejected his proposal.

The filmmaker won a prototype created by English cinematographer Robert William Paul, and was so excited with it, started out shooting the streets of Paris. One day, the mechanism of the camera locked, returning to work a few minutes after. By revealing the film, the filmmaker saw a car turn into a bus, which enthused Méliès. He gave the trickery the name of stop-action.

Georges was passionate about illusionism, uniting the fantastic to the macabre. One of his first films, “The Man with the Rubber Head” (1901), brings the filmmaker as a scientist who cuts off his head to inflate like a bellows. In “Journey to the Moon” (1902), he shows a spacecraft being sent to the moon, and “moonlanding” in the eye of our satellite, with the fights with Selenites, and a glorious return trip to Earth.

Méliès’s films became more and more elaborate, with many special effects, always with transformations and disappearances. The films of that time were silent and black-and-white, but Méliès put colors in his productions, with hand-painted frames, one by one.

Due to his perfectionism, and with the approach of World War (none could imagine that there would be a second one), George Méliès ended in bankruptcy, and many of his original films ended up being sold as scrap, for the extraction of silver, a detail which is shown in “Hugo”.

In 1923 he was declared bankrupt, and his beloved theater was demolished. Méliès has virtually disappeared into obscurity until the late ’20s, when his valuable contribution to cinema was recognized by France in 1931, when he received the distinction of the Legion of Honor, and housing at the Chateau D’Orly, a retreat for artists of cinema , which he would be the first occupant, and where he lived the last years of life.

Georges Méliès died in 1938, after making five hundred films at all – financing, directing, shooting and starring in almost all of them.

Instead of opting for a biopic of Méliès – it certainly would be fantastic – Scorsese chose a lyrical, dreamlike vision that brought the viewer the essence of which the cinema is built: the imagination.

No wonder that the film is competing in several Oscar categories, for the care e perfectionism that was taken. The cast is also perfect, especially Ben Kingsley, who already has a physical resemblance to the real George Méliès, and even Sacha Baron-Cohen, who proves to be a good actor, when he get rid of eschatological roles as “Borat” and “Bruno” .

Although not a children’s film, the indicative classification for all ages allows it for watching with the whole family, which is a good opportunity to understand why the slogan has long claimed the cinema as being the best fun.

An additional fun are the real parts of the films of Méliès, and two other great humorists little known today, Harold Lloyd and Buster Keaton. Check it out.