Les Misérables

Les Misérables is a beautiful, at times breath-taking film. A wonderful musical that makes you feel good by making you feel terrible. Tom Hooper skillfully brings justice to the art of film and stage at the same time. His developed film style brings together beautiful cinematography (minus the questionable hand held shots I’m willing to ignore) and seamless sound design/editing. Hooper’s adaptation is sure to please fans of the story and/or musical. As a first time viewer of Les Miserables I can speak on behalf of newcomers when I say I didn’t even realize how much I was missing out on.

Let’s begin with the outstanding performances. Anne Hathaway blew me away. She is played a wonderful Fantine. Her rendition of “I Dreamed a Dream” had me tearing up in the first act of the film. Not to mention it was all in one continues shot. Russell Crowe’s was great – as always. His singing was unanticipated and not in a bad way. I had read up on the film before going to see it and from all the reactions I walked into the theatre with very low expectations. While they clearly have him avoiding high notes, his singing - while not comparable to the rest of the cast - was on key. Russell’s performance was a very different tone than lots of the other actors and I enjoyed seeing him on screen. Mr. Crowe’s physical presence was enough to bring Javert to life. Hugh Jackman’s performance was wildly enjoyable. Minor hiccups in his performance but nothing film shattering. His voice – one I’ve come to love – bothered me at times - however he did still manage to bring it in full force for “Bring Him Home”. His strong acting saved him. Amanda Seyfried is not just a pretty face. She hits probably the highest notes in the film. I’m sure if she had a nickname on set it was “Dog Whsitle”. Eddie Redmayne however was the biggest shock to me. I last saw him in the Pillars Of The Earth HBO series so I had an idea of what to expect from him. He delivered a terrific performance and showed real talent with “Empty Chairs At Empty Tables”. Helena Bonham Carter and Sacha Baron Cohen were great comic relief. Quite the supporting roles. On top of all the great performances it’s really Hooper’s insistence on shooting all the singing live that really changes things. It does more than you could possibly imagine for the acting; a real game changer. Until you see for yourself you can’t understand.

Don’t get me wrong. This movie is not flawless. It’s far from perfect. It’s that imperfection, that daring risk that everyone took that made it so surprising. There were lots of times I felt second hand embarrassment for the people on screen. Then again I’d like to see any other director try and develop a plot using singing dialogue and not come off as silly at times. Some questionable death scenes, some awkward dialogue, all things I found forgivable at the end of the day. The pacing was the only aspect that wrecked it for me. A lot of the scene-to-scene transitions were just plain awful. It felt rushed at times. While I’m sure people would have been turned off by a 4 hour version of this I would have loved to see some of the scenes slowed down because all those scenes that felt like they would never end, those are are the memorable ones. They’re the ones that made this movie. There are lots of things that could have been better. Nonetheless I thoroughly enjoyed the 2 hours and 40 minutes.

There are just so many people to praise for this incredible feat. The costumes were fantastic. The set design was wonderful. The cinematography, sound design, editing; it was all done well. This is a big achievement for Tom Hooper and we can expect to see more great things from him.

My Rating: 8/10