Tintin and the Mystery of the Golden Fleece (1961)

Simply Perfect

Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

If it wasn't for my dad I would not have known that this Tintin movie actually exists. Ignoring the more recent Spielburg offering, the only Tintin movie that I knew of was Tintin and the Lake of Sharks (which I have not seen in a very long time) so when I discovered that this one existed I decided to see what it was like. I enjoyed it but unfortunately the brilliance of the Herge albums does not seem to come across all that well, despite this being written during the later part of the series.Captain Haddock receives a letter advising him of the death of a former comrade and that all of the possessions of this comrade, which consists of a boat, is given to Haddock. However the catch is that Haddock must make the final delivery, so the Captain and Tintin travel to Istanbul to pick up the ship and deliver the cargo of rugs to Athens. However, as can be expected, when they arrive, very substantial offers are made to them for the boat, and suspecting a mystery is afoot, Tintin decides that he wants to investigate further.This is a live action movie and as a movie they actually did very well in creating the characters. In fact each of the characters appear so similar to the actual comic book characters it is amazing. The Asterix movie that I saw came nowhere near to making the characters appear as they do in the comics. Unfortunately though, which the Captain's rather colourful language seems to work really well in the comics, it just never seemed to work all that well on the screen. I can't quite remember the more recent movie, but this movie, and the cartoon series, the language always seems to be forced and unnatural, and I suspect that is because the language is so unusual that it makes it very difficult for an actor to replicate it.The other thing that I enjoyed about this movie is the fact that it was set in Greece. I never really realised how visiting a country or a city actually changes our perception of the city when we then see it on the screen. All of the sudden, when we see places that we know and have visited we can visualise it so much better. Okay, I didn't get to go to Metanoia (a collection of monasteries sitting atop rocky pinnacles) and the Pireaus seemed a little unrecognisable, but then again this was made fifty years ago. Also, I did notice that the roads in Athens were nowhere near as chaotic as they are today.There were parts of this movie that reminded me of other aspects of the comics, such as when he was on a tour of Istanbul only to find himself imprisoned in a tower, and also where people are attempting to buy the boat off of him for ridiculous amounts of money, however, other than that, this was an enjoyable movie, but nowhere near as great as the comics were.

This is easily the best of the two live-action Tintin adaptations(the other being TINTIN ET LES ORANGES BLEUES which was ok, but nothing special). For the uninitiated, Tintin is the well known Belgian comic book character created by Herge. Every French-speaking child and most European children have grown up following his many comic book adventures. The film is not an adaptation of a Tintin story but this does not matter greatly. Instead we have an exciting adventure that sees Tintin and Capitaine Haddock travel to Turkey to claim a boat(the Toison D'or)that the good captain inherited from a friend. The intrigue starts at this point as numerous people want the boat for some mysterious reason. Jean-Pierre Talbot is perfectly cast as Tintin. Not only does he resemble the character physically but he shares the enthusiasm and athletic agility of his comic book counterpart. Georges Wilson is also good as Capitaine Haddock(gruff and a little silly). The beautiful sun-drenched Turkish and Greek locations are a delight to look at and the story moves along at a good clip. Milou the dog is also quite good. What more can one ask for? An excellent film for the young and young at heart.

This is the sort of children's story - and yeah, okay, father's story too - that you can sit and watch with the kids time and again. The music especially is truly memorable. We love this film and now my kids are showing it to their friends and they love it too.

I should know this movie fairly well, since it was a central object of scrutiny for my film major thesis. And I must say, being a Tintin devotee since the late seventies, I enjoyed this film quite a lot.It's not a direct adaptation as such, since the story did not exist as a comic book prior to the shoot. The script was in fact specially conceived for this particular movie. Nevertheless, apart from a few more or less significant deviations from the Tintin norms - some of them necessary by way of making a film in its own right and not a live action comic book (the latter more true in the case of the sequel) - it's still very much a Tintin story. We have the same ingredients; the exotism, the heroism, the adventure... And the characters are being portrayed wonderfully. So, I give it 7 out of 10 points.A must-see for all Tintin fans. If you can get your hands on a copy, that is.