The Problem with Hugo

~Here Be Spoilers~

I am not a machine. You cannot find the right key to make me work. You cannot use parts of me to make another person work. You cannot spend enough time on me that will make me work. Again: I am not a machine.

I just finished watching Hugo. It was a little predictable, and I didn't like that the unsavory characters had dialects associated with lower social classes than the protagonists (this is common in films; it is called dialect discrimination), but I have a huge problem with the central message of the film.

In the film, the central protagonist and titular character, Hugo, inherited an automaton (robot) from his father. (Actually, the automaton belonged to the museum the father worked for, but we'll continue in the spirit of he-who-loves-it-most-deserves-it.) He works to restore it, find its key, and make it work.

Enough with the automaton reaction shots!

What bothers me enough to write a blog entry is that the automaton becomes a metaphor for people who have issues. The former antagonist in the film, Papa Georges, makes this clear in his end speech: "Ladies and gentlemen, I ... I am standing before you tonight because of one very brave young man who saw a broken machine and against all odds, he fixed it. It was the kindest magic trick that ever I've seen." The eye contact and reaction shots make it clear that Papa Georges is the fixed machine.

I wish the film had charmed me like it did critics. I wish the moral at the end had been more complex. The simplicity of the solution--it's OK, we found his old films!--though it is historically accurate meant Papa Georges' character flaws were reducible to a single cause. If only that were true in real life! If only we all were broken birds, and all we needed was for a "very brave young man" to pay attention to us.

If you enjoyed this film, wonderful! I wish I had. I expected to like it, but there were a lot of little things that didn't add up for me, and the big message is so problematic it depresses me.