Steampunk Remediation: Hugo (2011) and The Golden Compass (2007)
Hollywood, as the most prominent film industry in the world, is capable of transforming children’s books into a sophisticated and multi-faceted film adaptation. Its production allows stories catered to children to develop and reach a wider audience from multiple age groups, including adults. Remediation, a process of interpreting existing media and reforming it into another medium (Bolter & Grusin, 1999), might also take place in the production of children’s tales adaptation. Hugo (2011) and The Golden Compass (2007) are modern examples of films adapted from a children’s book that involves remediation. Both films have a distinct and unique way of remediating the written text and even much older pieces of media than the book itself. The public categorized Hugo and The Golden Compass as steampunk movies due to the involvement of machines and technology in their stories. Therefore, this article will discuss how the narratives of two beloved children’s books are reconstructed into feature films, thus presenting remediation of older media, and how machines have significance in the plot and character development in the adaptations.
Remediation of Hugo and The Golden Compass
Both Martin Scorsese and Chris Weitz brought the widely loved children’s novels, The Invention of Hugo Cabret (2007) by Brian Selznick and His Dark Materials: Northern Lights (1995) by Philip Pullman, onto the big screen. Hugo tells the story of an orphan boy, Hugo Cabret (Asa Butterfield), who wishes to seek the truth behind the automaton his deceased father left while living within the walls of a station in Paris and operates the clocks. Meanwhile, The Golden Compass tells the journey of Lyra Belacqua (Dakota Blue Richards), a young orphan girl in the parallel world where humans have their animal familiar called dæmon. She travels to the North to rescue kidnapped children along with her dæmon Pantalaimon or “Pan” (Freddie Highmore), trustworthy alethiometer, and loyal allies. In Hugo, Scorsese creates cinematic realism by remediating the novel’s written text, illustrations, and some of the footage from Georges Méliès’ early films. It is worth mentioning that remediation as a media reforming tool works in both directions, which means recent media can reform older media and vice versa because they rely on each other (Bolter & Grusin, 1999).
Hugo and The Invention of Hugo Cabret depend on one another through the additional scene of Isabelle (Chloë Grace Moretz) starting a book about Hugo’s life at the end of the film. It was not mentioned in the original written text at all. As the screenwriter, John Logan’s decision to insert this scene resulted in a collaboration between the novel text and the film that tells Hugo’s tale to readers and viewers rather than as a replacement (Clement & Long, 2012). One might also think that Hugo mostly remediates the written text of The Invention of Hugo Cabret. However, Clement and Long (2012) pointed out that the film remediates Méliès’ cinema of attractions, which was remediated by the novel through illustrations, more than it remediates the written text. Aside from that, the cinema of attractions is replaced with narrative cinema in Hugo. Scorsese also puts two different connections on display; one between cinema and robotics (Hugo and the automaton) and another between cinema and prosthetics (the Station Inspector with his prosthetic left, which he got from his injuries from the Verdun War) (Nast, 2011).
On the contrary, remediation in The Golden Compass is done simply by reforming the written text of the novel (older media) into narrative cinema (recent media). Pullman created a fictional universe for His Dark Materials trilogy based on real places, actual scientific concepts and theories, and existing machine technology. Pullman might have also remediated some mechanical blueprints in his novel to create a design for the vehicles used in the His Dark Materials universe. The trilogy explores contemporary science ideas, such as dark matter, quantum entanglement, and human evolution (Darqueling, 2020). In The Golden Compass, specifically, the dark matter concept is discussed through the existence of Dust as a cosmic particle that constructs the parallel cosmos. Human evolution ideas are also introduced through the presence of dæmon as the animal familiar to humans, who might have been described as the soul, but in essence, more as a part of one’s brain outside their body (Newitz, 2007). Weitz’s The Golden Compass remediates Pullman’s Northern Lights by adapting its narrative, characters, and world-building, then turning the written scenes into scenes in a motion picture. Nonetheless, there were a few tone changes that Weitz needed to make for ratings and censorship because Pullman originally wrote the novel far more wicked, bleaker, and darker. It is a generally faithful adaptation, save for the tamer and more family-friendly nature.
The Significance of Machines in Hugo and The Golden Compass
The term “steampunk” was coined for the first time by an American sci-fi author K.W. Jeter in a letter that he sent to Letter Magazine in 1987 (Steampunk Avenue, 2021). Oxford Dictionary (2022) defines steampunk as the subgenre of science fiction, which involves machines fueled by steam, mechanical gears, and modern yet retro technology from the 19th century. As mentioned earlier, steampunk elements are implemented in Hugo and The Golden Compass and have a significant role in the narratives. In Hugo, clockwork is present throughout the film, from his clockmaker father, Mr. Cabret (Jude Law), to the automaton machine operated by a customized clockwork. The presence of clocks lays the foundation of the whole narrative, serving as a symbol that has a connection to the background story of Hugo’s character. It enriches his origin as the son of a clockmaker and reinforces the importance of clockwork as the only connection to his deceased father. The audience can see the extraordinary bond Hugo shares with his father from the flashback scenes, which led to Hugo developing a love for working with machines after working on the automaton together with his father. It shows how his life revolves around clockwork as a clockmaker’s son.
Since Hugo grew up surrounded by clocks and gears, he eventually learned how to tinker around with them. They remain present in Hugo’s life even after his father’s death and become an inseparable part of his life, as he gets the job of managing the clocks at the train station. The automaton, however, plays the most crucial role in the narrative and his life because it becomes his main objective, biggest desire, and motivation that drives the storyline. It strengthens the relationship between Hugo and his father, builds the friendship between Hugo and Isabelle, and gives Hugo a new family in the end. The automaton also serves as the symbol of truth for Hugo and Isabelle, as it reveals the hidden message about Hugo’s father and Isabelle’s godfather, Papa Georges (Ben Kingsley), that the robot holds. Although machines in steampunk fiction are usually the imagined version of actual 19th-century engines, Hugo is still considered a steampunk fiction by most of the audience despite having more accurate clockwork and machines used in the 1930s.
On the other hand, The Golden Compass implemented steampunk elements in the transportation technology and Lyra’s clockwork device, the alethiometer. Since The Golden Compass took place in a parallel world, Pullman and the production team had more leisure to experiment with the technology used in that world, creating a combination of actual machinery in reality and made-up technology. In The Golden Compass Featurette (2007), production designer Dennis Gassner mentioned that it is the amalgamation of ideas, which took bits of unique architecture to create a new signature. To him, adding a new signature is what a parallel world needs. Thus, the world of The Golden Compass uses a fictional fuel called anbaric technology to generate energy for their vehicles, which are old-fashioned yet modern-looking 19th-century transportation. Dan Walker, the conceptual artist from the production team, explained that this technology is loosely based on the armillary spheres, an instrument to demonstrate the movements of sky objects. Throughout the film, these spheres are visible in the central hub of the carriage that Lyra and Mrs. Coulter (Nicole Kidman) rode, under the balloons of Lee Scoresby’s airship, and on each side of Mrs. Coulter’s zeppelin. They all serve the same function as the source of energy, generating power by rotating at the same time.
Much like Hugo, The Golden Compass places focus on one specific device, the alethiometer. It is a gold-colored artifact that looks similar to a compass with three different needles pointing at symbols circling the rim, hence the movie title. It possesses the magical ability to reveal the truth; however, only a few selected individuals, including Lyra, can decipher its symbols and read the answer. The emotional and interpretive nature of the device connects to shamanism and pre-scientific understanding of the universe (Rennie, 2008). The alethiometer is the most notable machine with a vital role in the narrative. It is the primary source of conflict between Lyra Belacqua, Mrs. Coulter, and the Magisterium. It reunites Lyra with the Gyptians (Jim Carter, Clare Higgins, Tom Courtenay), aeronaut Lee Scoresby (Sam Elliott), the Armored Bear (panserbjørn) Iorek Byrnison (Ian McKellen), and the Witches (Eva Green) to be the allies that help her rescue the captured children in Balvangar. As the only person who can read the device, Lyra consults the alethiometer almost every time before she makes a big decision. The alethiometer also assists other characters in developing their character arc in the film. For instance, Iorek Byrnison was the prince of the Ice Bear Kingdom in Svalbard. He was supposed to be the next king but was shamefully defeated by his contender, Ragnar Sturlusson (Ian McShane), in a battle. Following his defeat, he was exiled from the kingdom and resided in Trollesund, working labor for the townspeople. When he met Lyra for the first time, she helped him track the armor the townspeople took away from him through the alethiometer, resulting in Iorek finding his spirits back after finally wearing his armor again. Later in the film, Lyra and the alethiometer helped Iorek get his rightfully owned throne back from Ragnar. Iorek Byrnison turned from an exiled ice bear prince, drinking away his shame in a small, dingy town, to a noble king with the help of the alethiometer through Lyra.
Conclusion
Remediation of older media exists in Hugo and The Golden Compass, even though both films did it distinctively. In Hugo’s case, the remediation is done in a specific order: the book remediates Méliès’ early films into illustrations, then the film remediates the written text and stills of Méliès’ cinema of attractions. The remediation depends on one another due to the additional Isabelle scene at the end, linking Hugo to The Invention of Hugo Cabret by imposing the idea of Isabelle writing the book. The Golden Compass, on the other hand, mostly remediates the written text of the novel and reforms it into a film because the His Dark Materials universe is a fictional world created by Pullman based on reality.
As steampunk-themed films, Hugo and The Golden Compass machinery is similarly involved in the narratives. Hugo shows the recurrent appearances of clockwork throughout the film, even inside the story’s focal point, the automaton. The automaton becomes the symbol of Hugo’s character, giving him purpose, desire, and motivation. Contrastingly, The Golden Compass created a hybrid of real machines and made-up technology called the anbaric technology. However, similar to Hugo, it also focuses on a specific device known as the alethiometer. The alethiometer serves as the primary source of conflict, decision-making helper, and character development tool. All in all, Hugo and The Golden Compass illustrate the application of remediation in pop culture media and contribute to the steampunk sub-genre by involving clockworks and 19th-century-like advanced technology.
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