Happy 78th Birthday, Tintin!

Last week, January 10, 2008 was the 78th birthday of Tintin, the all time great comic hero. The masterpiece revealed the adventures of Tintin in 1929 this day. Tintin was so popular in fact that more than three million books of Tintin‘s escapades are sold each year, in 58 languages. But to say the truth, you’ve not experience the real TINTIN until you’ve read it. Although the character is Belgian he is highly regarded in France. Once the late French President Charles De Gaulle had said, “… deep down, my only international rival is Tintin!“.

The first Tintin book I’ve read was Tintin in Tibet (Bangla translation) 14 years ago. And even today I feel the same excitement to read the series (again n’ again). What is lack there? Actually nothing! Tintin, with his famous spikes (tuft) of blond hair, continually battled evil with the help of his dog Snowy and the drunken Captain Haddock accompanied by the muddled genius Professor Calculus and the Thompson Twins.

The good news is that according to industry reports, Steven Spielberg and The Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson are to bring Tintin to the big screen. Movie publication Variety reports that, Spielberg and Jackson are teaming to direct and produce three back-to-back features based on Georges Remi’s beloved Belgian comic-strip hero Tintin for DreamWorks. Movie will be produced in full digital 3-D using performance capture technology. Jackson’s special effects team Weta Digital has already produced a 20-minute test reel showing how the finished films might look.