Hugo (2011)

Last weekend, The Globe’s Liam Lacey wrote an interesting piece about the mass anxiety facing the film industry as technological changes undermine the traditional methods whereby cinema is created, distributed, consumed and interacted with. He likened the current flux of uncertainty with the advent of the sound film in the late ’20s and early ’30s. Almost overnight, the world of cinema changed in that era as well and there were cries that the sky was falling from all concerned. With Hugo and The Artist garnering a mitt full of Oscars each on Sunday, Lacey suggests that, in spite of the industry’s general decline, these pictures are reflective of both a reverence for the past and, perhaps more importantly, a keen eye on the future.

Hugo particularly, is a product of this brave new digital era and Martin Scorsese has delivered what might be the best American film of the past 10 years, and in 3D no less. It’s a perfect match for his immeasurable strengths as an historian of cinema, an archivist and innovative filmmaker in his own right. What makes Hugo such a terrific watch, however, is not the wow factor of Scorsese’s liberal use of cutting edge technology, but rather the age-old skill of telling a great story well. The technology doesn’t get in the way of the story but rather augments and expands how it’s told.

With a foot in both camps on the issue of how cinema is being impacted by evolving technologies and a dumb-downed audience clamoring for endless Superhero retreads and Twilight sequels, Hugo serves as a giant step forward into a digital cinematic form that fans of film don’t have to recoil in horror from. It’s both a great work of filmmaking and an example of how technology can be used as a means to an end, not the end itself.

 Bravo Marty. You’ve created another masterpiece.