- Interviews With Reclusive Belgian Cartoonist Herge Reveal Political and Psychological Forces Behind Creation of Legendary Cartoon Hero Tintin - Who was Tintin? Indeed, who was his creator, Herge? Tintin was the determined and resilient hero of a comic book series that took him on thrilling adventures around the world - and on some voyages not quite of this world. Though Tintin is not as well known in the U.S. as in Europe, his distinctive tuft of ginger hair and Herge's no less distinctive drawing style will ring a bell with many Americans. Appearing from 1929 to 1982, the series took Tintin to the planet's most exotic places to confront danger, treachery and political machinations, with an emphasis on the fast-paced visuals of trains, planes, cars, bombs and other new technologies. Both character and creator were unambiguous. Tintin was literally and emblematically a Boy Scout who always lived up to the Boy Scout code, no matter how dire, dark, strange or adult the situation. He was the ideal with whom Herge identified. But, as revealed in Anders Ostergaard's "Tintin and I," airing on PBS Tuesday, July 11, 2006, 10:00-11:30 p.m. ET (check local listings) as part of the 19th season of P.O.V., it was the treacherous and uncertain world around Tintin into which Herge poured the reality of his own life. Based on 14 hours of audio interviews recorded in 1971 - heard here for the first time - "Tintin and I" shows that Herge ended up creating in art a powerful graphic record of the 20th century's tortured history. That same evening, P.O.V. presents the award-winning short film "Lawn" by Monteith McCollum, who directed P.O.V. "Hybrid" (2002). In 1971, the French-born Numa Sadoul (later an actor as well as a writer) was a young journalist doing a series of interviews with comic-book artists. Drawn to Brussels, the center of European cartoon art, Sadoul took a chance and knocked on the door of the artist he most wanted to meet. He had no reason to expect a welcome from Herge, nom de plume of Georges Remi, whose creation, The Adventures of Tintin, had been captivating millions of European children and not a few adults for more than 40 years. Since World War II, Herge had faced a blacklist for working under the German occupation, the embarrassment of abandoning his Catholic marriage and a nervous breakdown. The naturally reticent artist had grown even more reclusive. To Sadoul's surprise, Herge not only welcomed him into his studio but also consented to being interviewed. The encounter led to 14 hours of audio interviews, recorded over four days, in which Herge opened up with remarkable candor. Though the interviews later became the basis for a book, they were so heavily edited and rewritten by Herge - perhaps recollecting the reasons for his former reticence - that the book was far from a faithful representation of his thoughts over those four days in 1971. Now, 30 years after the fact and with the full support of the Herge estate, Herge's talks with Sadoul have formed the basis of "Tintin and I." Herge's voice - gentle, prodding, laughing - takes us through the twists and turns of a life he readily admits was written into the adventures of the Boy Scout he once thought he was, or at least strove to be, even as the European world was spinning violently out of control. Director Ostergaard pays homage to the master's art by animating archival footage of Herge to sync up with Sadoul's audio, lending Herge's voice an uncanny visual presence. He has also turned some of the Tintin series' most famous panels into 3-D scenes through which the camera moves, yielding new insights into Herge's art, especially its detail and dramatic formal structures. Sadoul is also on hand, still in awe as he recounts his meeting with Herge. Scholars Harry Thompson (who died in 2005), Fanny Rodwell and Gerard Valet add their appreciations and accounts of the social and artistic circumstances under which Herge worked. Even Andy Warhol, in archival footage, turns up for at least 15 seconds in appreciation of Herge's popular - and just maybe pop - art. But it is the voice of Herge himself, intertwined with his animated image and striking family and public archival footage, that forms the drama of "Tintin and I." "Millions of kids in many different countries have grown up with the adventures of Tintin, which is reason enough to make a portrait of Herge," says director Ostergaard. "But Herge's story, the life of a dreamer whose inner clarity was so much in conflict with the world outside him, was very moving itself. Can't you, especially if you are an artist or other creative type, just remain inside the dream? You can't. Not without paying a high price. It's a sad story, I guess, but the result was Tintin, a visual icon of the 20th century."
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