Hugo Cabret
Encyclopedia
Hugo is a 2011 3D adventure
drama film
based on Brian Selznick
's novel The Invention of Hugo Cabret
, about a boy who lives alone in a Paris train station, and the enigmatic owner of a toy shop there. It is directed by Martin Scorsese
and written by John Logan
. It is a co-production of Graham King
's GK Films and Johnny Depp
's Infinitum Nihil
. The film stars Asa Butterfield
, Chloë Grace Moretz
, Ben Kingsley
, Sacha Baron Cohen
, Ray Winstone
, Emily Mortimer
, and Jude Law
.
Hugo is Scorsese’s first film shot in 3D
. It was released in the U.S. on 23 November 2011, with distribution by Paramount Pictures
in that country.
best of all. Hugo's father dies in a museum fire, and he is taken away by his uncle, an alcoholic watchmaker who is responsible for maintaining the clocks in the railway station. His uncle teaches him to take care of the clocks, and disappears. Hugo lives between the walls of the train station, maintaining the clocks, stealing food and working on his father's most ambitious project: a broken automaton
—a mechanical man who is supposed to write with a pen, that Hugo's father had found and hoped to repair. Hugo steals mechanical parts in the station to repair the automaton, but he is caught by a toy store owner, who takes away Hugo's blueprints for the automaton. The automaton is missing one part—a heart-shaped key. Convinced that the automaton contains a message from his father, Hugo goes through desperate lengths to fix the machine. He gains the assistance of Isabelle, a girl close to his age and the goddaughter of the toy shop owner, and he introduces Isabelle to the movies, which her godfather has never let her see. Isabelle turns out to have the key to the automaton, which unlocks it to produce a drawing of a film scene Hugo remembers his father telling him about. They discover that the film was created by Georges Méliès, Isabelle's godfather, an early – but now neglected and disillusioned – cinema legend, and that the automaton was a beloved creation of his from his days as a magician. In the end they reconnect Georges with his past and with a new generation of cinema aficionados which has come to appreciate his work.
and Paramount Digital Entertainment will release the game on the Nintendo DS
and Nintendo 3DS
with Jude Law reprising his role as Hugo's father and Joshua Seth
playing Hugo Cabret (replacing Asa Butterfield
).
acquired the screen rights to The Invention of Hugo Cabret
shortly after the book was published in 2007. Hugo was filmed at London’s Shepperton Studios
as well as on locations in London
, Paris
and the Nene Valley Railway
near Peterborough, who also loaned their original Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits rolling stock to the studio.
reported that 126 of the tallied 131 reviews were positive, for a score of 96% and a certification of "fresh". In comparison, Metacritic
, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, gave the film an average score of 85 based on 36 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".
Roger Ebert
of Chicago Sun-Times
gave the film four-out-of-four stars saying "Hugo is unlike any other film Martin Scorsese has ever made, and yet possibly the closest to his heart: a big-budget, family epic in 3-D, and in some ways, a mirror of his own life. We feel a great artist has been given command of the tools and resources he needs to make a movie about—movies."
Hugo was selected for the Royal Film Performance
2011 with a screening at the Odeon, Leicester Square in London on Monday, 28 November 2011 in the presence of TRH The Prince of Wales
and The Duchess of Cornwall in support of the Cinema and Television Benevolent Fund
.
National Board of Review selected Hugo as Best Picture and Martin Scorsese
as Best Director of 2011. .
Adventure film
Adventure films are a genre of film.Unlike pure, low-budget action films they often use their action scenes preferably to display and explore exotic locations in an energetic way....
drama film
Drama film
A drama film is a film genre that depends mostly on in-depth development of realistic characters dealing with emotional themes. Dramatic themes such as alcoholism, drug addiction, infidelity, moral dilemmas, racial prejudice, religious intolerance, poverty, class divisions, violence against women...
based on Brian Selznick
Brian Selznick
Brian Selznick is a Caldecott-winning American author and illustrator of children's books.-Life and career:Selznick was born in East Brunswick Township, New Jersey...
's novel The Invention of Hugo Cabret
The Invention of Hugo Cabret
The Invention of Hugo Cabret is a historical-fiction book written and illustrated by Brian Selznick and published by Scholastic Press. The hardcover edition was released on January 30, 2007, and the paperback edition was released on June 2, 2008. With 284 pictures between the book's 533 pages, the...
, about a boy who lives alone in a Paris train station, and the enigmatic owner of a toy shop there. It is directed by Martin Scorsese
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
and written by John Logan
John Logan (writer)
John David Logan is an American screenwriter, playwright and film producer.-Personal life:Logan was born in San Diego on September 24, 1961. His parents emigrated to the US from Northern Ireland via Canada. The youngest of three children, he has an older brother and sister...
. It is a co-production of Graham King
Graham King
Graham King, OBE is a British film producer. He is also President and CEO of Initial Entertainment Group. He is best known for his Academy Award winning 2006 crime thriller film The Departed, which was awarded the Best Picture Oscar at the 79th Academy Awards.King was appointed Officer of the...
's GK Films and Johnny Depp
Johnny Depp
John Christopher "Johnny" Depp II is an American actor, producer and musician. He has won the Golden Globe Award and Screen Actors Guild award for Best Actor. Depp rose to prominence on the 1980s television series 21 Jump Street, becoming a teen idol...
's Infinitum Nihil
Infinitum Nihil
Infinitum Nihil is Johnny Depp's production company which is run by his sister Christi Dembrowski. Depp founded the company in 2004 to develop projects where he will serve as actor and/or producer.The Rum Diary, based on the eponymous novel by Hunter S...
. The film stars Asa Butterfield
Asa Butterfield
Asa Maxwell Thornton F. Butterfield is an English actor, best known for starring in the Holocaust film The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas , as Norman in the 2010 film Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang, and playing the title role in Martin Scorsese's 2011 fantasy Hugo.-Life and career:Butterfield was born...
, Chloë Grace Moretz
Chloe Moretz
Chloë Grace Moretz is an American actress, known for her role as Hit-Girl in the 2010 superhero film Kick-Ass. She also appeared in The Amityville Horror, Days of Summer, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Hugo, and portrayed Abby, the child vampire, in Let Me In.-Personal life:Moretz was born in Atlanta,...
, Ben Kingsley
Ben Kingsley
Sir Ben Kingsley, CBE is a British actor. He has won an Oscar, BAFTA, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild awards in his career. He is known for starring as Mohandas Gandhi in the film Gandhi in 1982, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor...
, Sacha Baron Cohen
Sacha Baron Cohen
Sacha Noam Baron Cohen is an English stand-up comedian, actor, writer, and voice artist. He is most widely known for his portrayal of three unorthodox fictional characters: Ali G, Borat, and Brüno...
, Ray Winstone
Ray Winstone
Raymond Andrew "Ray" Winstone is an English film and television actor. He is mostly known for his "tough guy" roles, beginning with that of Carlin in the 1979 film Scum and as Will Scarlet in the cult television adventure series Robin of Sherwood. He has also become well known as a voice over...
, Emily Mortimer
Emily Mortimer
Emily Kathleen A. Mortimer is an English actress. She began performing on stage, and has since appeared in several film and television roles, including Scream 3, Match Point, Lars and the Real Girl, and Shutter Island....
, and Jude Law
Jude Law
David Jude Heyworth Law , known professionally as Jude Law, is an English actor, film producer and director.He began acting with the National Youth Music Theatre in 1987, and had his first television role in 1989...
.
Hugo is Scorsese’s first film shot in 3D
3-D film
A 3-D film or S3D film is a motion picture that enhances the illusion of depth perception...
. It was released in the U.S. on 23 November 2011, with distribution by Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
in that country.
Plot
Hugo is a fantasy adventure that takes place in a Paris railway station in the early 1930s. Hugo Cabret is a young boy whose mother has died and who lives with his father, a master clockmaker, who takes him to see films and loves the films of Georges MélièsGeorges Méliès
Georges Méliès , full name Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès, was a French filmmaker famous for leading many technical and narrative developments in the earliest cinema. He was very innovative in the use of special effects...
best of all. Hugo's father dies in a museum fire, and he is taken away by his uncle, an alcoholic watchmaker who is responsible for maintaining the clocks in the railway station. His uncle teaches him to take care of the clocks, and disappears. Hugo lives between the walls of the train station, maintaining the clocks, stealing food and working on his father's most ambitious project: a broken automaton
Automaton
An automaton is a self-operating machine. The word is sometimes used to describe a robot, more specifically an autonomous robot. An alternative spelling, now obsolete, is automation.-Etymology:...
—a mechanical man who is supposed to write with a pen, that Hugo's father had found and hoped to repair. Hugo steals mechanical parts in the station to repair the automaton, but he is caught by a toy store owner, who takes away Hugo's blueprints for the automaton. The automaton is missing one part—a heart-shaped key. Convinced that the automaton contains a message from his father, Hugo goes through desperate lengths to fix the machine. He gains the assistance of Isabelle, a girl close to his age and the goddaughter of the toy shop owner, and he introduces Isabelle to the movies, which her godfather has never let her see. Isabelle turns out to have the key to the automaton, which unlocks it to produce a drawing of a film scene Hugo remembers his father telling him about. They discover that the film was created by Georges Méliès, Isabelle's godfather, an early – but now neglected and disillusioned – cinema legend, and that the automaton was a beloved creation of his from his days as a magician. In the end they reconnect Georges with his past and with a new generation of cinema aficionados which has come to appreciate his work.
Cast
- Ben KingsleyBen KingsleySir Ben Kingsley, CBE is a British actor. He has won an Oscar, BAFTA, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild awards in his career. He is known for starring as Mohandas Gandhi in the film Gandhi in 1982, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor...
as Papa GeorgesGeorges MélièsGeorges Méliès , full name Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès, was a French filmmaker famous for leading many technical and narrative developments in the earliest cinema. He was very innovative in the use of special effects...
, the toy shop owner - Asa ButterfieldAsa ButterfieldAsa Maxwell Thornton F. Butterfield is an English actor, best known for starring in the Holocaust film The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas , as Norman in the 2010 film Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang, and playing the title role in Martin Scorsese's 2011 fantasy Hugo.-Life and career:Butterfield was born...
as Hugo Cabret - Chloë Grace MoretzChloe MoretzChloë Grace Moretz is an American actress, known for her role as Hit-Girl in the 2010 superhero film Kick-Ass. She also appeared in The Amityville Horror, Days of Summer, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Hugo, and portrayed Abby, the child vampire, in Let Me In.-Personal life:Moretz was born in Atlanta,...
as Isabelle, Georges' goddaughter - Sacha Baron CohenSacha Baron CohenSacha Noam Baron Cohen is an English stand-up comedian, actor, writer, and voice artist. He is most widely known for his portrayal of three unorthodox fictional characters: Ali G, Borat, and Brüno...
as Inspector Gustav - Jude LawJude LawDavid Jude Heyworth Law , known professionally as Jude Law, is an English actor, film producer and director.He began acting with the National Youth Music Theatre in 1987, and had his first television role in 1989...
as Hugo's father, a clockmaker - Christopher LeeChristopher LeeSir Christopher Frank Carandini Lee, CBE, CStJ is an English actor and musician. Lee initially portrayed villains and became famous for his role as Count Dracula in a string of Hammer Horror films...
as Monsieur Labisse, the bookshop owner - Helen McCroryHelen McCroryHelen Elizabeth McCrory is a British actress. She portrayed Cherie Blair in both the 2006 film The Queen and the 2010 film The Special Relationship. She also portrayed Narcissa Malfoy in the final three Harry Potter films....
as Mama JeanneJeanne d'AlcyJeanne d'Alcy was the earliest French film actress. She was the wife of French cinema pioneer Georges Méliès from 1926 until his death in 1938....
, Georges' wife - Michael StuhlbargMichael StuhlbargMichael S. Stuhlbarg is an American theatre, film and television actor.-Life and career:Stuhlbarg was born in Long Beach, California and raised in Reform Judaism. He trained at Juilliard School and also studied acting at the National Youth Theatre of Great Britain, University of London and UCLA...
as René Tabard, a film historian - Emily MortimerEmily MortimerEmily Kathleen A. Mortimer is an English actress. She began performing on stage, and has since appeared in several film and television roles, including Scream 3, Match Point, Lars and the Real Girl, and Shutter Island....
as Lisette, the flower girl - Ray WinstoneRay WinstoneRaymond Andrew "Ray" Winstone is an English film and television actor. He is mostly known for his "tough guy" roles, beginning with that of Carlin in the 1979 film Scum and as Will Scarlet in the cult television adventure series Robin of Sherwood. He has also become well known as a voice over...
as Claude Cabret, Hugo's uncle. - Frances de la TourFrances de la TourFrances de la Tour is an English actress perhaps best known for her role as Miss Ruth Jones in the British sitcom Rising Damp, and as Madame Olympe Maxime in the film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1.-Early life and family:De la...
as Madame Emile, the owner of the café - Richard GriffithsRichard GriffithsRichard Griffiths, OBE is an English actor of stage, film and television. He has received the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Play, the Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Featured Actor and a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actor...
as Monsieur Frick, the newspaper seller - Marco AponteMarco AponteMarco Aponte Moreno is a Venezuelan/French actor and academic born and raised in Caracas, Venezuela.-Acting career:Aponte's acting career started in the late 1990s in the off-off Broadway theater scene of New York City. He studied drama at the HB Studio and at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute...
as train engineer assistant
Video game
THQTHQ
THQ Inc. is an American developer and publisher of video games. Founded in 1989 in the United States, the company develops products for video game consoles, handheld game systems, as well as for personal computers and wireless devices...
and Paramount Digital Entertainment will release the game on the Nintendo DS
Nintendo DS
The is a portable game console produced by Nintendo, first released on November 21, 2004. A distinctive feature of the system is the presence of two separate LCD screens, the lower of which is a touchscreen, encompassed within a clamshell design, similar to the Game Boy Advance SP...
and Nintendo 3DS
Nintendo 3DS
The is a portable game console produced by Nintendo. The autostereoscopic device is able to project stereoscopic 3D effects without the use of 3D glasses or any additional accessories. The Nintendo 3DS features backward compatibility with Nintendo DS series software, including Nintendo DSi software...
with Jude Law reprising his role as Hugo's father and Joshua Seth
Joshua Seth
Joshua Seth Freedman is an American entertainer and voice actor. He was born in Kent, Ohio and attended the New York University film school. He has voiced dozens of well known anime characters and is sometimes credited as "Jeremiah Freedman", but has retired from voice acting in 2005...
playing Hugo Cabret (replacing Asa Butterfield
Asa Butterfield
Asa Maxwell Thornton F. Butterfield is an English actor, best known for starring in the Holocaust film The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas , as Norman in the 2010 film Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang, and playing the title role in Martin Scorsese's 2011 fantasy Hugo.-Life and career:Butterfield was born...
).
Production
GK FilmsGraham King
Graham King, OBE is a British film producer. He is also President and CEO of Initial Entertainment Group. He is best known for his Academy Award winning 2006 crime thriller film The Departed, which was awarded the Best Picture Oscar at the 79th Academy Awards.King was appointed Officer of the...
acquired the screen rights to The Invention of Hugo Cabret
The Invention of Hugo Cabret
The Invention of Hugo Cabret is a historical-fiction book written and illustrated by Brian Selznick and published by Scholastic Press. The hardcover edition was released on January 30, 2007, and the paperback edition was released on June 2, 2008. With 284 pictures between the book's 533 pages, the...
shortly after the book was published in 2007. Hugo was filmed at London’s Shepperton Studios
Shepperton Studios
Shepperton Studios is a film studio in Shepperton, Surrey, England with a history dating back to 1931 since when many notable films have been made there...
as well as on locations in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
and the Nene Valley Railway
Nene Valley Railway
The Nene Valley Railway is a preserved railway in Cambridgeshire, England, running between Peterborough Nene Valley and Yarwell Junction. The line is currently seven and a half miles in length...
near Peterborough, who also loaned their original Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits rolling stock to the studio.
Reception
Hugo has received critical acclaim; review tallying website Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
reported that 126 of the tallied 131 reviews were positive, for a score of 96% and a certification of "fresh". In comparison, Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, gave the film an average score of 85 based on 36 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
of Chicago Sun-Times
Chicago Sun-Times
The Chicago Sun-Times is an American daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois. It is the flagship paper of the Sun-Times Media Group.-History:The Chicago Sun-Times is the oldest continuously published daily newspaper in the city...
gave the film four-out-of-four stars saying "Hugo is unlike any other film Martin Scorsese has ever made, and yet possibly the closest to his heart: a big-budget, family epic in 3-D, and in some ways, a mirror of his own life. We feel a great artist has been given command of the tools and resources he needs to make a movie about—movies."
Hugo was selected for the Royal Film Performance
Royal Film Performance
The Royal Film Performance is a charity performance of a British film which is attended by members of the British Royal Family. The proceeds from the evening's entertainment are donated to the Cinema and Television Benevolent Fund, a charity which offers financial support to people from the film,...
2011 with a screening at the Odeon, Leicester Square in London on Monday, 28 November 2011 in the presence of TRH The Prince of Wales
Charles, Prince of Wales
Prince Charles, Prince of Wales is the heir apparent and eldest son of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. Since 1958 his major title has been His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales. In Scotland he is additionally known as The Duke of Rothesay...
and The Duchess of Cornwall in support of the Cinema and Television Benevolent Fund
Cinema and Television Benevolent Fund
The Cinema and Television Benevolent Fund is a charity associated with the United Kingdom film, cinema and commercial television sectors. Its chief executive is Brian Robertson....
.
National Board of Review selected Hugo as Best Picture and Martin Scorsese
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
as Best Director of 2011. .