The Polar Express (2004)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2004
	Director: Robert Zemeckis (Back to the Future 1-3, Forrest Gump, Cast Away, Contact)
	Actors: Tom Hanks (Forrest Gump, The Green Line, Saving Private Ryan), Leslie Zemeckis (Beowulf), Chris Coppola, Michael Jeter
	Country: USA
	Genre: Animation, Fantasy
	Conditions of visioning: 02.12.2012, Blu-ray, Home cinema
Synopsis: On Christmas Eve, a little boy starts to be skeptical about the whole Santa Claus thing, until he is invited in the middle of the night to board an express train en route to the North Pole.
Review: A snowy December week-end evening is the perfect time to watch a Christmas movie. I have been wanting to watch this one for some time as it is a kind of precursor in the category of full motion capture movies and led to Beowulf, Avatar, Tintin and many more as time goes. The human characters are not yet fully photo-realistic like in Tintin, but the spirit is there. The technique allowed Tom Hanks to play several roles, from a small boy to a middle-aged train conductor to Santa himself. The train trip sometimes feels like a roller-coaster ride, and it must be a lot of fun to watch in 3D. However I didn't really feel involved in the story, maybe because I am not a child anymore (although it is true that I collect books about dinosaurs). Still, it contains all the ingredients to make a nice Christmas movie for kids: animation, adventure, Christmas songs, friendship, life lessons, and of course the Christmas spirit!
Rating: 5 /10