May 29 2009 See You Guys at 'Tintin' Around Christmas 2011

Something for your kitten calendar: Steven Spielberg's The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn will be released internationally in late October/early November 2011 before arriving in US theaters December 23. Try to mark it down, but in case you forget, I'll try to remind you sometime that calendar year.

On a somewhat related note, I finally started reading the Tintin comics, and they are nuts. Every page introduces a new conflict that is serendipitously resolved by the next page. For example: "Ut oh, Tintin has been tied to a massive dumbbell and thrown into Lake Michigan! Oh, phew, it turns out they accidentally tied him to a circus strongman's fake, wooden dumbbells that float. Tintin is safe!" Something like that happens every page. It's madness. Who knew the series would be so amazingly ridiculous, besides the millions worldwide who read it decades ago?

Apr 17 2009 From the Set of 'Tintin': Actors in Motion Capture Suits

Empire has been on location on the set of Steven Spielberg's chapter of the Tintin trilogy, The Secret of the Unicorn, where the magazine took the above shot of actors Jamie Bell and Andy Serkis motion-capturing their respective parts as Tintin and Captain Haddock. The shot obviously reveals nothing about the look of the film, but I have to say, Serkis is doing a pretty good job masking his resentment that he has to wear one of these futuristic American Gladiator suits every fucking time Peter Jackson gets near a camera. Well done, Gollum.