We were at last night's Academy screening in North Hollywood, along with a packed enthusiastic industry audience. In broad strokes, we'd call it a major triumph AND disappointment, as any stage-to-screen adaptation is bound to be.
THE TRIUMPHS: 1. Anne Hathaway and Eddie Redmayne leapt off the screen with spectacular turns, making Fantine and Marius far more honestly moving than I had ever seen onstage. Stunning, both. 2. The opening 40 minutes of the film: from the first image up till the escape to Paris, the screen was magnificently alive, blasting through great scenes one after the next, crammed through with rich character, plot and song at such breakneck speed, it left us breathless. 3. The finale: one brilliant and beautifully inspired stroke from Tom Hooper lifted that tired final reprise onstage into something moving and new onscreen, which I won't spoil here. 4. The live singing: Tom Hooper told the audience nearly 99% of the singing was sung live onscreen, and boy, was he right to insist on it-- a brave new way to make movie musicals come to life again. Every movie musical to come should take notes. 5. The design work: production design, costume, lighting were altogether spectacular ideas and radically different than the choices made onstage. Ravishing and idiosyncratic.
THE PARTS THAT ONLY MET EXPECTATIONS: 1. Hugh Jackman, Amanda Seyfried, Sacha Baron Cohen, Helena Bonham Carter. Exactly as gaunt/ passionate/ comical/ looneytunes as we've come to expect of these folks. All in good voice (though Jackman sings the part less than any onstage ValJean has), all nailing their bits, but they fade from view thinking back.
THE DISAPPOINTMENTS: 1. Regrettably... there's no avoiding that Russell Crowe simply can't play Valjean's antagonist if he isn't equal to Jackman vocally, which he is not. Opaque, passionless, and misdirected throughout (footsteps on a ledge early on to foretell his end are real embarrassments), Crowe doesn't have a chance here. 2. Tom Hooper (or his editors) seemed unable to hold 2 singing characters onscreen at once. "A Heart Full of Love" should be a duet (and then a trio), but is chopped into a barrage of close-up single shots, one after the other. This inability to give us wider takes suggests Hooper was not staging his scenes so much as placing characters in fixed spots and locking cameras to points on the floor to cover them. Where's the swirling camera work of a Joe Wright when you need him? 3. Once we get to Paris, the story slows to a crawl, the song order gets jumbled to smooth over the loss of the intermission, ("Can You Hear the People Sing" slides later and later in the show) and forward momentum all but disappears from the screen. A shame, because the stage show always snowballed to an Act I finale that gave goosebumps every time. 4. "Suddenly", the new song. Oh please. A waste of screen time that stops the show cold.
BOTTOM LINE? Every musical committed to film is reason for rejoicing. Flaws and all, this one is closer to being a great work than most. Gives new meaning to Thanksgiving weekend.
Updated On: 11/25/12 at 09:39 AM
