BY GRANT HERMANNS

As pointed out by the Corridor Crew visual effects artists, while the technology of The Polar Express was impressive, one small CGI glitch made it into the final cut of the film. This 2004 movie adapts Chris Van Allsburg’s children’s novel of the same name. It tells the story of a young boy invited aboard a magical train bound for the North Pole. Together with several other children, he goes to meet Santa Claus before Santa sets off to deliver Christmas gifts overnight. Starring Tom Hanks in multiple roles, The Polar Express drew wide attention for using motion capture to recreate the iconic imagery from Van Allsburg’s picture book.

In the newest episode of the group’s “VFX Artists React” series, Corridor Crew revisits the classic Christmas animated adventure, The Polar Express.

The VFX team specifically calls out a scene in the film’s second half. The children arrive at the North Pole aboard the eponymous locomotive and are greeted by a large crowd of elves. The trio highlights a CGI error in which one elf has no animation, leaving the character simply floating above the ground. The team goes on to discuss how this Polar Express CGI glitch ended up in the finished film, ranging from potential file corruption to server overload. You can watch their breakdown of the glitch starting at the 13:10 mark in the video above.

How The Polar Express Became a Milestone in CGI Filmmaking

Though partial motion capture had been used in the years before its release, The Polar Express stands as a milestone of CGI filmmaking because it was the first fully motion-captured feature film. Hanks, who previously collaborated with Robert Zemeckis on the Oscar-winning Forrest Gump and Oscar-nominated Cast Away, served as the motion capture reference for six characters including the unnamed protagonist. Zemeckis originally planned for him to play even more roles, but changed course after realising the toll it would take on his lead star.

Upon release, critics were divided over the motion capture filmmaking of The Polar Express. Some praised its striking visuals, while others argued the visuals fell deep into the uncanny valley. That did not stop Zemeckis. For nearly two decades afterward, he continued experimenting with the technology, including his adaptation of Beowulf a few years later. He even returned to holiday storytelling with A Christmas Carol starring Jim Carrey.

While Zemeckis and Hanks’ more recent collaboration, Disney’s live-action Pinocchio, may have proven underwhelming, there is no denying it was built upon the foundation laid by their fully motion-captured work on The Polar Express. This unique CGI technique has since become a staple of the Marvel Cinematic Universe as well as James Cameron’s Avatar films. Zemeckis has begun work on a slate of new projects, including the film adaptation of Here, reuniting him with his Forrest Gump collaborators Hanks, Robin Wright and screenwriter Eric Roth. It will be interesting to see whether he revisits the technology he helped popularise.