The polar express
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | The polar express |
| Original title | The Polar Express |
 | |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 2004 |
| length | 96 minutes |
| Age rating |
FSK 6 JMK 0 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Robert Zemeckis |
| script |
William Broyles junior Robert Zemeckis Chris Van Allsburg |
| production | Robert Zemeckis Steve Starkey Gary Goetzman William Teitler |
| music |
Glen Ballard Alan Silvestri |
| camera |
Don Burgess Robert Presley |
| cut |
Jeremiah O'Driscoll R. Orlando Duenas |
Der Polarexpress (Original title: The Polar Express ) is a computer-animated children's film by director Robert Zemeckis from 2004 . The film tells the story of the children's book of the same name by Chris Van Allsburg . The film opened in German cinemas on November 25, 2004 and is part of the English film production of Castle Rock Entertainment .
action
On Christmas night, a little boy lies in his bed and, despite his doubts about Santa Claus, waits for the sound of the reindeer sleigh. In the course of the night, however, he heard the noises of a train and went to the front door, where a conductor was standing in front of a train called the Polar Express . He explains to him that the train is going to the North Pole and asks him to get on. After a moment's hesitation, the little boy does so.
On the drive to the North Pole, he met other passengers his age - including a nice girl, a “know-it-all” and the poorest Billy who got on the train last, who retired to the last wagon. During the train ride, the children are pampered with cocoa . The girl hides her hot chocolate under the seat to give it to Billy later. Before she can bring them to him, the conductor checks the tickets that have mysteriously got into the passengers' pockets, punching two letters in each. However, he overlooks the girl's ticket. While she and the conductor, who discovered the chocolate and acknowledges her good nature, bring Billy the hot chocolate, the little boy discovers the ticket and wants to give it back to the girl. It falls from his hand and disappears. However, she finds her way back to the train unnoticed when the conductor is about to complain about her absence. While the conductor disappears again with the girl, the little boy worries about his new girlfriend, discovers the ticket and makes his way to her.
The way, however, leads over the roof of the train. There the boy meets a tramp , who in conversation pretends to be the owner of the North Pole and the Polar Express, and who later turns out to be a ghost. He accompanies him on to the locomotive of the train, in which his girlfriend is and controls the train. The engine driver and stoker himself stand in front of the smoke chamber door and discover a herd of caribou . At the last moment the train can stop. The conductor, however, who has to adhere to a tight schedule because the train has to arrive at the North Pole at midnight, otherwise Christmas will not be applicable, notices that the stoker can communicate with the animals if he is pulled by the beard, and in this way loosens the problem.
As the journey continues - the little boy and the girl are still on the front platform of the locomotive - they travel on the world's steepest gradient, which, according to the warning sign, is 99% (corresponds to around 44.7 °), which equates to a rollercoaster ride, and across a frozen lake , on which the tracks are frozen away, so that the train has to drive over the breaking ice without rails. The girl, the conductor and the boy almost fell off the train if the tramp hadn't saved them at the last moment. With great difficulty the train can reach the tracks again. On the way back to their compartment, the conductor, the boy and the girl come through a train carriage with damaged toys on the way to being repaired at the North Pole. There the tramp allowed himself a joke and frightened the boy by warning him with a character by Ebenezer Scrooge not to become like him.
Five minutes to midnight, the polar express arrives at the North Pole just in time, and everyone except Billy, who remains in the rearmost car, gets off the train. However, the boy and girl want to convince Billy to celebrate Christmas and go back on the train. The little boy uncoupled the last wagon without being noticed; this drives down a slope and stops on a turntable . The children get out and discover elves in a nearby building who are preparing the last gifts. After they are done with it, the children follow them unnoticed. Eventually they find themselves on a treadmill where Billy discovers a present addressed to him. He grabs it and lands on a slide at the end of the treadmill. The girl and the little boy follow him. The slide leads them into a gift sack, which is brought by an airship to the place at the North Pole, where everyone is already waiting for Santa Claus.
There the three of them, along with the know-it-all who followed them unnoticed, are discovered by the elves (who claim to have known about their stay from the start) and handed over to the conductor. Mysteriously, all of this had happened since they arrived at the North Pole at 11:55 p.m. Santa Claus appears at midnight on the dot. A bell falls from the bridle of his sled onto the ground. The little boy picks it up and shakes it, but can't hear anything. Then he tries by saying that he wants to believe in Santa Claus and can now hear the bell. Then Santa Claus actually stands in front of him. The boy gives him back the bell. Now he can wish for the first present and chooses Santa's little bell, which he also receives and puts in his right jacket pocket. Santa Claus then sets off on the annual way to distribute the presents.
When the boy has to show his ticket again before the return trip, with the conductor expanding the letters to a word (believe), he discovers that his little bell has disappeared because his right pocket has a hole. When he opened his presents the next morning at home with his parents and sister Sarah, he found the bell again. His parents do not know who this gift is from and think the bell is broken because it makes no sound to their ears because they do not believe in Santa Claus.
synchronization
The synchronization work took place at Interopa Film GmbH in Berlin. Alexander Löwe wrote the dialogue book .
| role | actor | German speaker |
|---|---|---|
| The little boy |
Tom Hanks Daryl Sabara (child) |
Tim Schwarzmaier |
| conductor | Tom Hanks | Arne Elsholtz |
| Tramp | Tom Hanks | Arne Elsholtz |
| Ebenezer Scrooge | Tom Hanks | Arne Elsholtz |
| Santa Claus | Tom Hanks | Roland Hemmo |
| Father of the boy | Tom Hanks | Tobias Master |
| Lonely boy | Jimmy Bennett | Julius Hasper |
| Mother of the boy | Leslie Zemeckis | Ulrike Stürzbecher |
| The know-it-all | Eddie Deezen | Hannes Maurer |
background
- In this film, a new technique called motion capture was used, which was already used for the role of the being Gollum during the filming of the trilogy The Lord of the Rings . The actors were first filmed in real life and their representation, facial expressions and gestures were then transferred to the digital figures.
- The film was the first Hollywood film to be completely converted into IMAX 3D format and shown in IMAX cinemas.
- Instead of fading in subtitles, the texts were translated into German for the German-speaking audience and brought into the picture for all scenes with captions.
- A preserved copy of the PM class N-1 No. 1225 (built in 1941) served as a template for the locomotive .
criticism
“The imaginative story is based on a successful children's book, but adorns its narrow narrative with numerous gimmicky experiences, which are intended to provide effective application possibilities for a new technology of digitizing human figures and embedding them in a computer-generated environment. The intended rediscovery of traditional values such as friendship, courage and faith comes to fruition in a number of intimate and poetic scenes, but is increasingly covered up by externalizations in the course of the action. "
“The sweet aesthetic and materialistic story is joined by sticky music that echoes in your ears for hours. After this film one would like to skip Christmas altogether. "
The very realistic, but still "lifeless" animation was mentioned several times as an example for the Uncanny Valley .
Honors
- 2004: Bambi in the International Film category for Tom Hanks
- 2005: Nominated for a Golden Globe in the Best Movie Song category for the song Believe
- 2005: Nominated for an Oscar in the categories of best sound , best sound editing and best film song ( Believe )
- The German Film and Media Assessment FBW in Wiesbaden awarded the film the rating particularly valuable.
literature
- Chris Van Allsburg : Der Polarexpress (Original title: The Polar Express ). German by Hansjörg Schertenleib . Carlsen, Hamburg 2001, ISBN 3-551-51561-1 .
- Ellen Weiss: The polar express. A Christmas Story. Novel. Based on the story by Chris Van Allsburg. German by Gabriele Haefs . Carlsen, Hamburg 2004, ISBN 3-551-35465-0 .
Web links
- The Polar Express in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Official website (German)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Release certificate for Der Polarexpress . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , February 2006 (PDF; test number: 100 408 DVD).
- ↑ Age rating for Der Polarexpress . Youth Media Commission .
- ↑ German synchronous index: German synchronous index | Movies | The polar express. Retrieved February 26, 2018 .
- ↑ The Polar Express. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed December 6, 2016 .
- ↑ Susanna Nieder: Christmas is difficult. Santa Claus has it out: "The Polar Express" . In: Der Tagesspiegel . No. 18,669 , November 25, 2004, Kino, p. 29 .
- ↑ Paul Clinton: Review: 'Polar Express' a creepy ride , CNN November 10, 2004, accessed December 15, 2015
- ↑ Barbara Herman: The 10 Scariest Movies and Why They Creep Us Out , Newsweek October 30, 2013, accessed December 30, 2015.
- ↑ Kristen Page-Kirby: 'The D Train' isn't actually about trains. But these 5 movies are. , The Washington Post, July 5, 2015, accessed December 15, 2015.