Movie Review- Les Miserables

I am a huge musical theater fan. My musical theater obsession peaked in the early-mid 90's, during high school, when I spent a majority of my allowance on obscure cast recordings and show tickets. This obsession has waned considerably, but I still love great musicals and hold a particular fondness for shows that I loved as a teenager. Les Miserables was one of these shows.

I've seen three National Tours of Les Mis. I've owned multiple cast recordings, multiple tee-shirts, a mug, a production book, a music box and as I am writing this post, I am overlooked by my full cast autographed Broadway Cares poster.

All this said, I was excited to see the movie version of Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schonberg's musical.

I walked out of AMC Burbank with an overwhelming sense of "That was just okay" and that it really was unnecessary. There isn't a lot of faults with the movie, it just wasn't as good as seeing it on stage, a lot gets lost in the movie format.

Confession time, I loathe most movie musicals, especially ones that are not intentionally campy. Campy is great and usually works. I have a hard time taking serious musicals seriously in a close- up format. I need the distance of the stage. Tom Hooper's choice of using extreme close-ups drove me batty. Occasionally it worked, especially with Anne Hathaway singing, I Dreamed A Dream, but he used it so much, that it started to feel like a gimmick and was distracting.

Probably the biggest reason to go see the movie version, is the cast. The critics have not oversold Hathaway, she is fantastic. Eddie Redmayne was a standout as Marius and Sacha Baron Cohen was a hilarious Thenardier. It was great to see so many of the stage alums in minor roles. The cast in this movie is exceptionally strong.

The only weak point was Russell Crowe as Inspector Javert. He's great as the character, but couldn't hold his own with the singing. As we left the theater, Dan summed it up, "Russell Crowe tried really hard." A for effort, but he didn't pull it off.

I would have cast someone else in place of Helena Bonham Carter in the role of Madame Thenardier. She was playing the same role that she has been many years. I know she's married to him, but I want Carter to get out of her kooky Tim Burton phase and go back to playing complex characters. She wasn't bad as Madame Thenardier, it was just such obvious casting.

The flip-flopping accents drove me nutty, but that happens in every stage production too.

It's long. The stage version is long too, but having the intermission really helps. The movie just felt too long. I have not seen or listened to Les Mis in many years and watching it last night, made me realize that certain songs are a lot weaker than others. I've never cared for Eponine and her story-line and as good as Samatha Barks was in the role, A Little Fall of Rain just adds more time to the movie. It's unnecessary, as Eponine's love for Marius and her motivations are not subtly revealed in the movie before she sings her ballad. The whole love triangle really bogs down the story.

Something that works on stage, but not so well on screen, are numbers like A Heart Full of Love, with multiple characters singing and layered voices. This is where Hooper should have pulled back from the extreme close-ups.

As I've grown older and become exposed to more musicals, Les Mis, doesn't resonate with me as strongly. It's very much a product of the 80's, when musicals were big and showy and it felt like each character had a reprise or their own show-stopping song, even when it wasn't necessary to further the plot.

I now much prefer musicals like Jason Robert Brown's The Last Five Years. It's has nothing in the way of showy production value and runs less than an hour and half. Yet, what is so brilliant is Brown's succinct writing. He doesn't belabor plot points or desires. There is constant forward motion. It's the most emotionally loaded musical that I have ever seen and it's all due to the exceptional writing. After revisiting Les MIs last night, I wished that they had been more ruthless with editing back in the 80's. I felt very little in the way of an emotional pull while watching the movie. Really, it just felt too long.

Bottom Line- There is not much technically wrong with the movie version, just the stage version is a better format for the musical and popularity aside, there are many better conceived musicals than Les Miserables.

Movie Review- Life of Pi

If there was one book that I couldn't imagine being turned into a movie, it had to be Yann Martel's Life of Pi. The discovery aspect of Martel's novel is so reliant on proper pacing and the play between the readers perceptions vs the reliability of the narrator, that it's not made for a film format. Even director, Ang Lee, couldn't believe it when the script came his way.

I was hesitant to see this movie, because I found the book to be so remarkable. However, the high critical praise, award nominations and James Cameron's pitch on the amazing use of 3-D, pulled me into the theater. Ang Lee is one of my favorite directors and also big draw for me.

Firstly, let me address the 3-D. I am sad to report that Life of Pi was not significantly improved by utilizing 3-D. It is a beautifully shot movie, but would be so, in a normal format. There is zero reason to pay the extra money to see this movie in 3-D. Zero.

I am so over this 3-D trend.

I can't think of another movie that does a better job with CG animals. The animals were rather incredible in this movie. When we came home, we had to double check to see if the animals were real or CG. It turns out that the Tiger was almost completely CG, except when it was in the water. The artists nailed it in this movie.

The only one bad CG moment, was when the tiger pulls the goat through the cage. There is no way possible that goat would have easily fit through the bars. I think this was more of a case of not thinking it through logically, but both Dan and I immediately mentioned it when exiting the theater. It's always a fail when a moment rips you out of the fantasy of the movie.

It's rated PG, but this is definitely not a movie for young children or overly sensitive adults. Yes, it's nature, but it's often very graphic and brutal.

If you have not read the book, don't see the movie. it's apples and oranges. The movie was okay and I guess it captured the essence of the book. The actors are all just fine and there are many gorgeous scenes. There was nothing technically wrong, it just wasn't even remotely as impactful as the book.

Both the movie and the book are 2/3 a slow build to the turning point. The difference between the two, is in the book, the build leads to a "whoa, a-ha" moment and in the movie, it's more of a "oh, huh". The movie format and pacing completely undercuts the climax. The story has huge themes that get a bit muddled in the film.

Bottom line- Read the book, it's fantastic. If you've read the book, wait for the DVD and watch with lowered expectations.

Movie Review- Lincoln

Steven Spielberg made several great decisions when he set out to tell the story of Abraham Lincoln's struggle to secure the passage of the thirteenth amendment as he struggled to end the Civil War. Spielberg is such a renowned and respected director, that I think his name alone, often drives people to the theater. However, on Lincoln, it felt more like Spielberg stepped back and surrounded himself with other people that could make this movie brilliant.

Daniel Day Lewis was born to play Lincoln. Really, there is nothing Lewis can't do and he's one of those rare actors that transforms himself each time he plays a new character. I will call it now, another Oscar for his shelf. The movie is very much an ensemble piece with a huge supporting cast of prestigious actors. I couldn't believe all of the familiar faces in minor roles, including an unrecognizable Jared Harris as General Ulysses S. Grant and Hal Holbrook as Francis Preston Blair. I love seeing John Hawkes in anything, he's such a great character actor.

The real stand outs are Sally Field, as Mary Todd Lincoln and Tommy Lee Jones, as Thaddeus Stevens. They both delivered searing and heartbreaking performances, as characters suffering from decisions made by others and out of their hands. Both characters are crushed by their circumstances and fighting to make their voices heard. They are in different predicaments, but mirror each other. all the same.

The outstanding cast was only part of the equation, I think the biggest reason for the brilliance of this film, is that the screenplay is by Tony Kushner. I am biased. Tony Kushner is my favorite living playwright. I absolutely love his writing and envy his talent.

I even had a personal encounter with him, one that made me respect him even more, if that was even possible. Many years ago, I saw him speak at UCLA Live and after the talk, I was first in line at the book signing. I had brought with me, my very tattered and much loved copy of Angels In America, both parts. When he came to sign my books, he had never seen those particular editions and was surprised at how much I had obviously read them. He ended up talking to me for long time, giving me writing advice and recommending authors. The line behind me was huge and growing impatient, but he kept chatting. I was blown away by this and can say with a 100% certainty, that this was the most star struck that I've ever been in my entire life. This includes the time that I ran, literally, full force into Meryl Streep and almost knocked her down. She was a class act about it too!

Kushner is one of those writers that can write epic stories, perfectly encapsulating the emotional core of a character and their drive in a single moment. There was nothing extraneous in the story and everything he writes drives both the plot and character. He has a knack for writing long monologues, yet no word is supplementary.

One of the things that I love the most about Kushner's writing, is his ability to inject levity into serious subject matter. He never tackles easy subjects, yet he always manages to make me laugh. Lincoln is a heavy drama, but it has many laugh out loud moments. I'm not sure how true it is to History, but the Lincoln in this movie, has a great sense of humor and timing.

The scale of the movie, a majority of it centering on the most critical last weeks of the thirteenth amendment vote, gives an immediacy and intensity to the story. It's not so much a Lincoln bio-pic, but the story of Lincoln's biggest legacy and of the other players in the history of the amendment. Bringing the story in on a micro scale, made it less about the man and more about the Historical significance of January 1865. In the bigger picture, it is a reminder that although the president might be the figurehead, but he is never alone in the decisions that change our History. Kushner always writes in so many layers, that it is impossible to stop thinking about his works and discovering new meaning.

I think that they should turn it into a stage play. Not just because Kushner is foremost a playwright, just the movie script would lend itself very well to a stage version and even with everything done right in this movie, it would be a very emotionally charged night done live. When a stage play is well done, when all the components gel, it creates an air of magic that just never quite happens in a movie theater.