Christmas Carol train

Motion capture animated film production techniques are on display juxtaposed with artifacts from Charles Dickens’ times. The result is a series of memorable displays, some interactive.

Traveling to Williams, Arizona, one of 40 stops on the train’s cross country schedule, I was fortunate enough to see the train and not wait more than 40 minutes to get onboard. At the entrance to the line, the sign said 45 minutes, so Disney delivered. (One of the Disney officials, who was walking the queue, confided that the line in Los Angeles had been a five-hour wait. So, we were fortunate. He likened the new movie to “Polar Express on steroids.”)

While in line, children were given activity sheets and “tattoos’ (temporary in a candy cane motif) and carolers sang holiday songs dressed in costumes appropriate to the mid-1800s. Fake snow blew from a disguised brick column and the attitude of everyone seemed to be excited and festive.

Christmas Carolers in Williams, Arizona

When we finally had our turn to enter the four train cars decked out in Christmas Carol décor (both the movie launching in November and items from the original Charles Dickens collection – on loan from the Dickens Museum in London), no one was rushing us to move through the exhibit. We could see period costumes, screens showing different aspects of the movie with interviews of the director and several actors and Dickens artifacts.

Woman's dress, circa mid-1800s

Disney used extremely realistic-looking images of old London to create the backgrounds for the movie.  Dickens would probably have found the locations recognizable.

Of course, there was a lot of space given to the wizardry of Disney’s efforts to morph Jim Carrey and the cast for the new Christmas Carol 3-D film, but the displays were engaging and the self-promotion not overwhelming.

Jim Carrey morphed as a young Scrooge

Carrey morphed as a teenaged Scrooge

(I’m a fan of Dickens’ work and was delighted to see an inkwell, original books and letters in his handwriting. They were in a display case, but were very exciting for a college English major – who studied Dickens for a full course – to examine.)

After reviewing the exhibits and displays, everyone had the opportunity to “morph” themselves into one of three characters in Christmas Carol. My terminal had technical difficulties, so we moved to another one and tried again. The second time, I was able to morph my face into a female, cherubic looking version of Mr. Bob Cratchit, and still look like myself.  Supposedly, we will have the image sent to us via e-mail from Wal-Mart.

After the train

Disney believes in giving great entertainment value.  So, after we finished looking at the train, we joined another line so that we could see “sneak peeks” of cuts of the actual movie using 3-D glasses. If you’ve never experienced 3-D before, it can be a weird feeling, as if things are coming at you off the screen. It was a more satisfying motion capture effort than Polar Express. The story is still the same as the original Dickens work, but Disney worked with great technical expertise to put the film on a new level for animation.

Clay masks - maquettes - of actors Jim Carrey and Gary Oldman

Jim Carrey and the other actors are certainly recognizable, but what we’re seeing is animated versions of the actors who actually performed their roles. Using barebones sets so they would have boundaries that coincided with the filmed sets, the “action” was “captured” and turned into animated film characters. We get to see both young and old versions of Jim Carrey, due to morphing, a fascinating exercise in aging.

Actors performing for motion capture

I’m not sure I would wait in line for 5 hours as they did in LA to see the exhibits, but I enjoyed the experience. If anyone has the chance to see The Christmas Carol train “in a city near you,” I recommend the free experience.

Forty cities will have visits from the train in the months until early November, as the train travels to both coasts and through the heartland of the United States. You can find additional information about the train at:

http://disney.go.com/disneypictures/christmascaroltraintour/

Tomorrow, more on our visit to Williams, Arizona.