The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn Gets a Dec. 23, 2011 Release Date
I have been following this film for awhile now and we finally have a release date announced by the studio as to when we are going to see the classic Herge character on the big screen. The Christmas tentpole is a 3-D motion-capture feature inspired by the globally famous character created by Herge in two dozen stories first published 80 years ago. Spielberg, Peter Jackson and Kathleen Kennedy are producing what is intended to be the first in a series of films derived from the Herge books. Steven Moffat, Edgar Wright and Joe Cornish wrote the screenplay with Doug Miro and Carlo Bernard also contributing on the project.
The movie stars Jamie Bell as the globetrotting Tintin, a young reporter, who faces off against the nefarious Red Rackham, played by Daniel Craig. Andy Serkis, Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Gad Elmaleh, Toby Jones and Mackenzie Crook also co-star. Combining the stories of The Crab with the Golden Claws and The Secret of the Unicorn, the film depicts Tintin’s (Jamie Bell) first encounter with Captain Haddock (Andy Serkis) and the discovery of a clue to the treasure of his ancestor Sir Francis Haddock. They set out to find it with protection from a jail escapee who tried to get the treasure as well as Detective Thompson and Thomson (Simon Pegg and Nick Frost)
Jackson’s Weta Digital has developed the performance-capture technology that Jackson himself will use when he directs the second film in the franchise. Spielberg started testing footage for the project last year and began filming officially in January.
This project has been sort of an up and down so it is nice to see it’s legs of development finally getting somewhere. Originally the film was supposed be co financed and distributed by Universal but they dropped out citing a budget that is too steep. Also the film’s star was originally Thomas Sangster but he had to drop out of the film due to the delays after Universal’s departure created scheduling difficulties. Something I am actually glad about because Jaimie Bell is a better choice.
