MANILA, Philippines - Regardless of the Oscar buzz surrounding Martin Scorsese's latest opus, "Hugo," in its heart it is more a story of dreams-forgotten and rekindled-as much as it is about the human search for connections, a sense of belonging and, yes, even inspiration. The man behind the camera, a master of the genre himself, Scorsese himself is touched by the story of the young Hugo Cabret [played in the movie by Asa Butterfield], the orphan boy who lives in a Paris railway station in Brian Selznick's children's novel, "The Invention of Hugo Cabret."
Four years ago, the book landed on Scorsese's lap. He sat down to read it and couldn't put the book down. "It was particularly the vulnerability of a child alone that was striking," the director notes. "Hugo's living in the walls of this giant engine of a sort-the train station-on his own, and he's trying to make that connection with his father, whom he has lost."
But the story takes a decidedly different turn by its second half, and it is here that the resonance to the boy's loneliness has taken a deeper meaning to Scorsese, just as it could be the case for many movie fans. For behind this orphan boy's story lies a magical world where dreams are captured and made true on screen. The boy's search for the last message from his father yields a sort of movie history lesson to viewers as well-particularly that of George Méliès (1861-1938), a French illusionist and filmmaker who rose to fame in the earliest days of cinema. Méliès had been so enamored by cinema at a time when even the Lumière brothers thought motion pictures were just a passing fancy.
Scorsese says, "There was an immediate connection to the story of the boy, his loneliness, his association with the cinema, with the machinery of creativity. The mechanical objects in the film, including cameras, projectors, and automatons, make it possible for Hugo to reconnect with his father. And mechanical objects make it possible for the filmmaker Georges Méliès to reconnect with his past, and with himself."
Far from his other master works like "Taxi Driver," "Raging Bull," "The Last Temptation of Christ," "Goodfellas," "Gangs of New York," and "The Departed," this is the director's first foray into a family picture shot in 3D, no less. While it is less a fantasy as the trailer might suggest, the movie doesn't require much from its audience in terms of expectation other than a healthy dose of wonderment. He even shared the book with his youngest daughter, with whom he "re-experienced the work," much like "rediscovering the work of art again, but through the eyes of a child."
Selznick, the author, himself recalls how his book came about. "At some point I remember seeing 'A Trip to the Moon,' the mesmerizing 1902 film by Georges Méliès, and the rocket that flew into the eye of the man in the moon lodged itself firmly in my imagination," he shares.
"I wanted to write a story about a kid who meets Méliès, but I didn't know what the plot would be. The years passed. I wrote and illustrated over 20 other books. Then, sometime in 2003, I happened to pick up a book called 'Edison's Eve' by Gaby Wood. It's a history of automatons, and to my surprise, one chapter was about Méliès."
Scorsese notes, "I had a DVD set, of course, of Méliès films, and there's an image of Méliès on the cover. One day on the set, two of the kids in the movie went by, both about 12-years-old. One saw the DVD box and said, 'Oh, there's Ben (Kingsley),' I responded, 'No, that's really Méliès.' 'You mean he existed, he's real?' I said, 'Oh, yes."'
And speaking very much like a movie devotee that he is, Scorsese also shares, "What's amazing about Méliès is that he explored and invented pretty much everything that we're doing now. It is in a direct line, all the way, from the sci-fi and fantasy films of the '30s, '40s and '50s, up to the work of Harryhausen, Spielberg, Lucas, James Cameron. It's all there. Méliès did what we do now with computer, green screen and digital, only he did it in his camera at his studio."
Scorsese continues, "His 'masterpiece,' the 14-minute 'Le voyage dans la lune' ('A Trip to the Moon'), was filmed in 1902. He went on to write, direct, act in, produce and design more than 500 films by 1914... Méliès is often referred to as the 'Father of Narrative Filmmaking,' with many crediting him with the birth of the fantasy, science fiction and horror genres."
Scorsese honors Selznik's work in every way, revealing that not only have they "always an inspiration" but that they "had copies with us all the time," but he has taken his own spin on his retelling. "The book has such a distinctive look, whereas our film has its own look and feel, very different from the book, which is in black and white, for one thing. We really went for a blend of realism and a heightened, imagined world," he says.
It is then, in this heightened world, that Hugo Cabret finds not just a whisper of hope from his departed father but a new sense of being and belonging. And for viewers who refuse to let their dreams slip away in the face of the increasingly tedious drone of reality, Scorsese's "Hugo" may just be the heart-shaped key that would keep them alive.
"Hugo" is nominated in 11 categories in this year's 84th Annual Academy Awards, including for Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Picture and Best Director [Scorsese]. It is currently screening in select 3D and 2D cinemas in Metro Manila.
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