Robert Zemeckis’ “The Polar Express” (2004) represents not only a turning point in the filmmaker’s career but a no-turning-back moment in visual effects.
Here was a film that showed us photo-realistic characters and vividly rendered CGI settings in a manner that was uncanny and chilling.
Despite the limitations of the 2004 technology, Zemeckis’ film seemed to be a portal into the future, a signpost of caution and wonder that led us to where we are today. The film showed both an over reliance on CGI special effects and, on occasion, a stunning ability to mimic reality.
The 1994 “Tales from the Crypt” episode Zemeckis directed, titled “You, Murderer,” which showcased a CGI “performance” from Humphrey Bogart footage, is now quaint, dated and just the beginning of how far Zemeckis and filmmakers of his ability were going to take pixels as human mimicry.
Hold onto your hats folks, and hand over your ticket for The Polar Express!
We open with a little boy, who is skeptical of all things Santa Claus and has many reasons to believe Santa isn’t real. The boy, who is never identified by name, wakes up one night to discover a locomotive and a long strand of train cars have arrived in front of his home, ready to take him and a handful of children to the North Pole.
A digitally rendered Tom Hanks plays the conductor (Hanks conveys a nice sense of weariness and heart to the role), while other roles are played by Eddie Deezen (eternally cast as an annoying, squawking voiced nerd)and Nona Gaye as a girl who befriends the boy. The late Michael Jeter, in his final role, co-stars as the train’s bearded engineer.
Oh, and Aerosmith turns up.
Hanks is so vivid an actor that the CGI rendering makes good use of his creative choices for the role(s). Deezen’s character is exactly right – there’s a kid like this in every classroom.
Tom Hanks really carried ‘The Polar Express’ with his multiple roles
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Despite how uncanny and accomplished much of the animation still is today, Zemeckis’ revolutionary film was criticized for the limitations of the technique, namely the emptiness in the eyes of the characters. Sometimes the lack of light in the protagonist’s peepers isn’t a problem.
In other moments, the lack of humanity is downright eerie.
While the criticisms are merited, it’s important to remember the film was never attempting that to begin with. The animation, from the very start, was always meant to be a recreation of the illustration style in Chris Van Allsburg’s 1985 children’s book.
The visual fuzziness says more about the pictures as they appeared in the book than where CGI was in 2004 (and please, please, let there never be a live-action remake of this).
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The plot wisely does the “Wizard of Oz” thing of never telling us if the fantastic parts of the story really happened or not. The first act (of which there’s more of the boy at home than one would expect) is masterful visual storytelling.
Then the train stops up to pick up a Dickensian boy, followed by a busy song and dance number about hot chocolate. It’s the first sign of Zemeckis overwhelming a simple story.
Whereas the plot of Gary K. Wolf’s 1981 novel “Who Censored Roger Rabbit?” was modified before it became “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” (1988, still Zemeckis’ best film), you can sense Zemeckis felt insecure about the spare quality of Allburg’s book (as well as the commercial need to pad the running time) and his giving this movie the equivalent of busy work.
“The Polar Express” holds up better than Steven Spielberg’s equally busy “The Adventures of Tin Tin” (2011) and many other early 2000’s, non-Pixar attempts at all-CGI film narratives.
I was dazzled by “The Polar Express” the first time I saw it (the big screen and a good sound system make it a tour de force in theaters) and I revisit it most Decembers, but it still feels a bit off and overproduced. An easy example- it’s fine that there are sky-diving elves at Santa’s North Pole, but Zemeckis can’t leave it at that and, also, insists on bungee-jumping elves in the same scene!
Moreso than any other early-aughts blockbusters, “The Polar Express” demonstrated, in ways good and bad, where visual effects-driven storytelling would be headed in the coming years.
The sound effects are also exquisite and as elaborately produced as everything else here. Yet, whereas the special effects in “Forrest Gump” (1994) are instruments to enhance the storytelling, what we have here feels like the f/x came first and the story and characters later.
It shouldn’t be that way.
Zemeckis’ film is both a loving recreation of the book and a bloated expansion of it (again, the Aerosmith cameo). “The Polar Express” represents everything good and bad about the post-“Cast Away” (2000) period of Zemeckis’ film career (the one exclusion is the terrific “Flight”).
From the exhilarating, hit and miss “Beowulf” (2007) to the ill-considered attempt to turn Dickens classic novel into the action movie this is “Disney’s A Christmas Carol” (2009) and on to the recent career lows of “The Witches” (2020), “Pinocchio” (2022) and this year’s ambitious and awful “Here,” Zemeckis has failed to align his filmmaking abilities with CGI as a storytelling tool.
Using CGI in a flamboyant, demonstrative way wasn’t a problem in terrific Zemeckis films like “Death Becomes Her” (1992) or “Contact” (1997). When the best thing about “The Walk” (2015) isn’t the story, characters or period setting but the power of the of the CGI in making the audience experience vertigo, you know something is off.
I wonder if Zemeckis needs to pare down the bells and whistles the next time out, in the way both “Flight” (2012) and “Allied” (2016) are character driven and propelled by performances, not spectacle.
Is a remake of “Romancing the Stone” (1984) on the docket?
I don’t think that Zemeckis’ best work is behind him, only that he inevitably peaked, fell in love with CGI tools over film technique (the two don’t necessarily go hand in hand) and, like M. Night Shyamalan, needs to fall in love with storytelling and characterizations again. I suspect he’ll make a comeback.
Interestingly, if I’m going to compare Zemeckis with Shyamalan, it’s worth noting that the latter’s “The Village” came out the same year as this film; the two films are very different but, in terms of strengths and weaknesses in the director’s body of work, they are telling as mixed achievements that followed with years of unsteady creative output.
When “The Polar Express” kicks into action-movie mode (think of it as “Bullet Train” for a Fisher Price audience), it’s always thrilling. I love the winter journey of a ticket stub, as well as the sequences where the train slides all over an icy lake, and the train thundering past the Elves’ workshop.
When the movie becomes a musical, that’s when it really tests my patience: I always look forward to revisiting Josh Groban’s Oscar-nominated “Believe” as it plays over the end credits. Then the other songs play.
Look, hearing Hanks “rap” over the end credits of “Dragnet” (1987) is a guilty pleasure, but when the two-time Oscar winner screams “Clang! Clang Clang!” and “Never Let It Cool!” over the title song and that awful hot chocolate number, I fled the theater.
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