“There was a time when men were kind…”
So
begins the most celebrated song from Les
Miserables, the blockbuster musical adaptation of Victor Hugo’s 1862 novel
of the same name. Originally written and produced by songwriter Alain Boublil
and composer Claude-Michel Schönberg in France, it has since inspired numerous
productions both in the U.S. and around the world, blossoming into one of the
most popular musicals of all time. It’s hard to believe that, although the
story of Les Mis has been translated into
film many times, including, most recently, a version starring Liam Neeson as
Jean Valjean and Geoffrey Rush as Inspector Javert, no one has managed to bring
the stage musical to the silver screen – until now, that is. After twenty years
of failed attempts, Oscar-winning director Tom Hooper has finally turned the
international sensation into a work of cinema.
Lovers
of the musical should not be disappointed. Hooper’s adaptation keeps the
sung-through style of the stage version intact; if I’d bothered keeping track,
I could probably have counted the number of lines of spoken dialogue on two
hands. And the grand scope certainly befits the inherent theatricality of a
stage musical. The movie opens with a sweeping overhead shot of the harbor,
where an army of convicts bound in chain gangs struggles to right a capsized
ship, their faces drenched in water and mud. It’s a jaw-dropping sight,
plunging viewers straight into the grit and grime of 19th century
France, and for the most part, the movie works best in scenes like this: epic, grandiose
and bursting with Big Emotions. As with many plays (musicals in particular),
subtlety is not in the vocabulary of Les
Mis. The symbolism is blatant (when Jean Valjean is forced to carry the
fallen French flag, he’s a personification of the working class that supports
the country through its typically unrewarded hard work); the characters openly
state their thoughts and feelings, more often than not through song; and the
themes of class, redemption and spirituality are broad. None of this is necessarily
bad. In fact, at times, Les Miserables
is quite moving.
Which
brings us back to “I Dreamed a Dream,” that famous show-stopper of a song. Here,
it’s performed live (no lip-synching, no recording) by Anne Hathaway, who,
after her scene-stealing turn as Selina Kyle/Catwoman in The Dark Knight Rises, once again proves that she’s much more than
a pretty face. For an actress that rose to fame with innocent, good-girl roles
like Mia Thermopolis in The Princess
Diaries and Andy Sachs in The Devil
Wears Prada, Hathaway has shown herself to be among the most magnetic stars
of her generation, lending charisma and soul to troubled, even unlikable
characters (her performance in the otherwise-mediocre Rachel Getting Married is a stunner) and displaying an admirable willingness
to take risks and challenge herself. As Fantine, perhaps the most demanding
role of her career so far, she shines, standing out in a starry ensemble cast
despite limited screen-time with a mixture of emotional vulnerability and sheer
bravura – not to mention her voice. The scene in which she belts out “I Dreamed
a Dream,” alternately wistful, anguished, defiant and forlorn, the camera
trained closely on her gaunt, tear-stained face, is not only the best scene of
the movie but also one of the most powerful and harrowing moments in cinema
this year. Hathaway deserves an Oscar nomination, if not a win, for that scene
alone.
The
rest of the cast ranges from good (Hugh Jackman, the underused Samantha Barks)
to subpar (Amanda Seyfried, who uses an irritating amount of vibrato and
struggles to hit the high notes). Other than Hathaway, the most talked-about
performance is probably that of Russell Crowe, whose casting as the stern,
tenacious Inspector Javert has drawn mixed reactions. Personally, although it
was a tad jarring at first to hear Crowe – who’s most well-known for tough-guy
roles in films like L.A. Confidential
and Gladiator – warbling Broadway
numbers, I didn’t have a problem with him. His voice is rather unpolished
compared to that of his more experienced colleagues (though it should be noted
that he did some musical theatre in Australia before breaking out in film), but
what he lacks in singing ability, he, for the most part, makes up for in acting
ability and screen presence. It’s nice to know that even after a few years of substandard
gigs, Crowe still has that spark of intensity that made him so mesmerizing to
watch in his late-‘90s heyday.
No,
what really brings Les Mis down, what
prevents it from being a truly successful movie, is the romance. Having
admittedly not read the book or seen the stage version, I have no idea how
faithful Hooper’s rendition of the Marius/Cosette/Eponine love triangle is to
the source material, but the simple fact of the matter is that not a single
aspect of the relationship between these characters was exciting or convincing.
First of all, in Seyfried and Eddie Redmayne, Hooper could not have chosen two more
lackluster actors to portray the young lovers. As individuals, they fail to
give their characters any nuance, never transcending the fearless hero and pure
maiden archetypes, and as a couple, they have no chemistry to speak of. We’re
expected to believe that Marius and Cosette are destined to be together, yet
when they only share one conversation throughout the entire movie (a
conversation that isn’t even particularly revealing), it’s hard to care about
what happens between them. As Eponine, Barks fares slightly better since it
seems as though she has an actual personality, and she does a nice job with “On
My Own,” the musical’s other signature number, but she still can’t convey why her
character is so in love with Marius, who never appears to give her a second
thought. Because the second half of the film is largely depended on the flimsy
relationship between Marius and Cosette, it drags, picking up only at the very
end when the focus returns to Jackman’s Jean Valjean. By then, though, the
movie has reached the 160-minute mark and long since run out of steam.
The
movie is also let down by Hooper himself. While the visuals – the costumes, the
set design – are mostly solid, the overall direction leaves much to be desired.
As with The King’s Speech, for which
he inexplicably won an Oscar, beating out more deserving contenders such as
David Fincher (The Social Network)
and Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan),
Hooper gives Les Mis a vaguely Masterpiece Theatre feel, perhaps a
remnant of his background in television. The lighting is frequently murky, and
he has an annoying tendency to either use extreme close-ups, showing us
numerous very scenic views of the pores on the actors’ faces, or rapid zoom-outs,
which are conspicuous enough to be distracting and serve no apparent purpose.
Hooper also has no idea how to film action scenes, as the battle sequences all exploit
the overworked shaky-camera approach, making them bewildering at best and
incoherent at worst.
Links:
http://www.digitalspy.com/movies/news/a395280/les-miserables-wont-be-camp-says-director-tom-hooper.html
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