Regular readers of this space will remember my review of Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. The use of technology was artful, but the story-telling suffered.

Seen in a regular theater "The Polar Express" is a similarly unsatisfying experience. But in IMAX, in 3-D, as I saw it today, that's another experience entirely.

From the moment the child rises from his bed, fearful of having missed Santa's visit, fearful it's just his dad waiting for him to sleep, you're transported into the world of the story. Disbelief is suspended, which is the film's entire point.

The Santa of this film is (and I'm sorry if this offends) a fascist daydream, an industrialist whose thousands of workers are completely loyal to the corporate mission. The North Pole here is a factory town, just a bit cleaner, homes and workshop integrated, life as production.

And the climax of this, of course, is Christmas Eve, when the boss comes out of his office to take the applause. And, in this case, to teach the lesson, that a belief in what seems impossible is essential to to making the impossible real.

Hanks plays the Dear Leader (Santa), the devoted Conductor who leads disbelieving children to their audiences , the narrator, the child's father, a hobo (or angel) the Hero Boy befriends, even the boy himself. Each in fact is an aspect of the whole man -- boy, man, soul, God, father, perspective. That's the grown-up point of this Santa story, which the cynical reviewer twisted into a political polemic a few paragraphs ago.

None of that is the point. The 3-D experience is the point. This is the first film I've seen that is made by 3-D. Others (like "Beauty and the Beast") have been converted by the process into 3-D, and still others have been made for 3-D. But this is an ordinary film made magical by a technological process.

I think Jerry Nims would be pleased. On every level.