Which Three Tintin Stories?
Three Tintin Books to Become Movies
According to Variety, three books have been selected as the basis of the Tintin movies. But which three? The books were mostly written and set in the 1930’s to 1950’s and not many of them will update. Destination Moon and Explorers on the Moon seem pointless 40 years after Neil Armstrong first walked there. Many of the books have social or cultural aspects that are not popular nowadays such as The Blue Lotus which is heavily anti-Japanese and the Crab with the Golden Claws is about oil and the middle east. Other books just won’t work as popular films, e.g. The Castafiore Emerald in which nothing happens.
Here is my guesses at the three Tintin movies
- King Ottokar’s Sceptre - Has espionage, puzzles and Borduria, a Nazi-like country next door
- The Calculus Affair - Has all the main characters, secret technology, kidnapping features Borduria & Syldavia from King Ottokar’s Sceptre
- Tintin in Tibet - Features a strong storyline, daring feats, lucky escapes, and a child. My money is on Speilberg directing this one
August 17th, 2007 at 7:58 pm
Is it a definite that these films are going to be set in the present? If Indiana Jones was really inspired (in part) by Tintin, as Spielberg apparently has said, then why would he not keep the stories set in their original time periods? I personally think updating them is a mistake.
The writing is not such an issue for me. I think Herge’ concocted some fine stories. The “coincidences” you cite in “Unicorn” (and there are other examples of this sort of thing in some of the other books as well) are simply devices to move the plot along. I don’t see them as big weaknesses.
Prisoners of The Sun would be one of my choices of a film I;d like them to do.
The Secret of The Unicorn/Red Rackham’s Treasure would be another.
But I guess we’ll see how it all turns out.
Whatever they do, I just hope they don’t screw it up. These films, like the books, could be classics if they do it all right.