Try to imagine the smell.Originally Posted by bryan1311
Is...dirty diaper wrapped in bacon an expression?
Try to imagine the smell.Is...dirty diaper wrapped in bacon an expression?
I mostly agree with Sio's complaints. I found the whole enterprise to be inconsistent and poorly developed. It's simultaneously overcooked and yet thinner than paper. During the first half, much of the proceedings left me cold and unmoved. It just felt phony and uninvolving with very little narrative momentum (for me, anyway). It certainly didn't help that Crowe and Jackman have such unpleasant voices (I suppose I would be more forgiving had the performances been more convincing). Even Hathaway's valiant efforts felt too calculated. I saw her brain working at every moment and it took me out of her performance and storyline, which I also felt needed about 10-15 more minutes of character development to earn the emotion of her song.
Fortunately, the second half had more of a spark, even if it suffers from the some of the same problems. Marius and the rest of the revolutionaries were a welcome addition. Eddie Redmayne was sublime and has the film's best moment. The film also ended rather strong with a powerful and rousing finale. Ultimately, I suppose some of my problems rest with the source material, but the lack of character/plot development stood out like a sore thumb on screen. But - at nearly 3 hours - there isn't much to be done.
Last edited by Submerge; 12-27-2012 at 11:12 PM.
Ok, I have never seen this show and I am not familiar with the source material really at all other than on a purely surface level, so I went into this really wanting to like it, but I just couldn't. Was it bad? No, but it was definitely not good either. I can see why Hooper is getting hammered for this, but I think the reviews are being a bit unfair. The main problem, I think, is the source material itself. This film is supposed to be so emotional and moving and wants us to care about all these characters, but we don't know who the hell they are. These aren't people. These are vessels created to sing and cry. Fantine is the perfect example of this. She's supposed to be this tragic, heartbreaking character and sure, I feel bad for all the awful things that happens to her, but do I really care? No. I mean we meet her, two minutes later, she's thrown out of her job, 3 minutes later, she's selling her hair and teeth and 5 minutes later she's dead. Yes, it's unfortunate, but I don't know who she is, so I just don't really care. That's the same thing for basically everyone other than Valjean and Javert (and these are unfortunately played by the weakest singers). They appear, sing and cry a bit and then die. Everyone is just so underdeveloped that nothing really adds up to much of anything.
By far the best part of the film is the third act with the revolution. Redmayne, Barks and Tveit are easily best in show here. Redmayne in particular was pretty fantastic. His Empty Chairs at Empty Tables is the only part of the film that even slightly moved me, even if it was ruined by Hooper's completely unnecessary closeups. I guess Seyfried was fine as well in actually emoting through song, but her character is so useless that it didn't really matter. The first two acts are really weak actually, mainly because they rest on the shoulders of Jackman and Crowe, neither of whom can really sing. The biggest disappointment of the film for me was Jackman, who I expected a lot from. His talk-singing did not do it for me at all. His voice sounded weak and thin. As for Crowe, I agree with every word of Stephanie Zacharek's review as far as he's concerned. This was easily one of the worst performances in a movie musical I've ever seen. He's not a terrible singer, but there is not way in hell he should have been singing this role. I was embarrassed for him. Every scene with Crowe and Jackman together was painful and felt like a bad high school musical. The less said about Baron Cohen and Bonham Carter they better. They were both utterly ridiculous and razzie worthy.
As for Hathaway, I will give her this, it was not an easy role. She's asked to do a lot in a very short span of time and she does her best, but ultimately she does not succeed. The entire performance is completely calculated and calibrated so as to win awards. Nothing about her was organic; I saw her thinking and acting through the whole thing and she never felt like a real person to me. Those who have said she'd be the best winner in the supporting actress category in possibly two decades are out of their minds. She wouldn't even be the best winner from a musical this decade as I thought both Zeta-Jones and Hudson were better by a wide margin. So much has been made about her presence being felt throughout the film even after her and death and I did not feel it at all. I kind of forgot about her until she comes back in the end, especially since I felt the 3rd act was the strongest part.
Lastly, a lot has been made of Hooper's use of closeups and while I don't think they were all that bad, the only time they truly worked was in I Dream a Dream. Empty Chairs at Empty Tables comes off the worst. Also, they built these seemingly intricate sets and because of these closeups no one can see any of them.
I get some of the criticisms. I think a good majority of the bad reviews were done with a bit too much malicious glee than was necessary. Musicals are a hard sell these days. Period. An oscar prestige piece of a beloved long running broadway hit? That's the ultimate catch to rip in sensationalized fashion.
Anne?
Eh. Honestly. I'd prefer Sally to get the Oscar over her. (Still need to see Kidman). I liked her performance. It was effective and strong, but it was nothing compared to Seyfried.I'll probably get lashed for that, but I feel like Cossette was one of the only characters to have legitimate background (aside from Jean ValJean and kinda Javert).So when it came time to sell the emotions at the end, Seyfried's performance shone through...EVEN with the annoying Fantine ghost crap mugging for more screen time.
Overall..I really enjoyed this. Could there have been more depth? Yes, but was that really possible? No. I felt like this was the first old-timey musical to hit the modern screen in a long time (if not the first since the golden era of Hollywood musicals). Does that mean this was great? No way! But it was enjoyable, well made, and the acting was fantastic.
I'd give this a B ish. Maybe higher, but that would require another viewing.
I understood the use of closeups and could care less about the dutch angles. In the end, I was not bothered at all by any of the directorial choices. I kinda appreciated the closeups on the more emotional numbers. They actually made the whole thing more intimate, which was needed since the project itself is epically grand and the characters are missing background stories.
Will Oscar have Riva Fever?
I just watched this.
Hathaway was great, but what an underwritten character.
Eddie Redmayne was MVP as it felt like he carried the second half of the film on his back for me.
Eponine or whatever was so useless and felt like she was there just to up the body count.
Helena Bonham Carter was great, as always though she didn't leave her comfort zone.
Hooper still hasn't made a film I've liked.
I didn't know he wrote the adaptation! Impressive!
That Victor Hugo was SUCH a hack.
I am in general rather ignorant about stage musicals and only familiar with the two famous songs from Les Miz ( I Dreamed a Dream and On My Own). I also saw the film right after Django Unchained so sitting through almost 5 hours of film can get tiring so that may have affected my judgements (theatre was rather old and didn't have the best seats). I feel like I am jumping on the bandwagon here as I fall in line with majority of the opinions regarding the film. The close-ups, weird angles and the sometimes frenetic camera work are all really distracting and it really does take you out of the film. It seems that Hooper really took the success of The King's Speech to his head and thought what every film needs are close-ups and Dutch angles. He seems obsessed with trying to milk every scene or song number of its emotional weight that becomes kind of pointless. I felt like the material in general isn't something I would like on film to begin with, but maybe with a more capable director the film would be such a choir to sit through.
The best part of the film as many mentioned are the performances from some of the cast. I thought Barks, Seyfried and especially Redmayne were enjoyable and had the vocals that worked well. Hathaway can definitely sing and emote, but I wasn't blown away or anything. Jackman was serviceable, which is kind of disappointing as I had assumed he had the chops to really sing so I am surprised at how weak vocally he is. Speaking of vocally weak, Crowe was really terrible. I read some reviews and had low expectations, but he was really awful. Whenever Crowe and Jackman were on screen, the movie was really excruciating to get through, which was essentially half the film. The audience I saw it with where mostly seniors and seemed to like it, I on the other hand was the first one out the door at the end.
I entirely agree with what you said about Hathaway's performance, except for the part about it being completely calculated to win awards. Thanks to Susan Boyle (don't get me started), "I Dreamed a Dream" is probably the most iconic song in Les Miz. Hathaway has all but said that she felt enormous pressure to do something special and unique with the song (which her mother also performed in one of the Les Miz road companies). Hathaway put so much effort into this that she ended up with an over-the-top performance that I just didn't buy at all--as you said, you can see her acting through the whole thing, which totally took me out of what she was trying to do. But, boy, did she try. If they gave Oscars for trying, she would win it hands down.
Last edited by steve4922; 12-27-2012 at 09:11 PM.
A big yes to all of this. This also reminds me of the another awkward transition when Fantine dies and suddenly Javert is at the bedside and then him and Valjean start fighting. This all is disappointing, specially how good are the production values (and the novel, though I do understand that it is based on the musical rather than the book.)
It wasn't until the uprising scenes that Hooper's direction really bothered me. On stage, it's understandable that this is rushed and somewhat hard to feel a sense of danger or suspense. Stage fights/battles are nearly always problematic. But on film, you should be able to do so much better. This was as clumsy and weirdly choreographed as any stage production, where the action feels rushed and designed primarily to make it easy for the dead bodies to get off stage before the next song.
And I join those who thought Jackman was weak. I was actually more let down with him than with Crowe. Crowe, at least fully embodied Javert in stature and attitude. Something about Jackman's performance was so wimpy. Part of it was his thin and high voice, but I also felt that after his release from prison, he never had that sense of toughness or savvy that I think you need to see to understand the character's resillence and continued survival.
Despite all that, I did actually like it. The live singing worked much better than I thought based on the soundtrack samples I heard. And apart from Jackman and to a lesser extent, Crowe, I thought the rest of the cast came through. After months of doubting Barks, I thought she was perfectly fine. Though I think the relatively minor cuts they made there really hurt the character's effectiveness.
In what way is this any more old-timey than The Phantom of the Opera or Sweeney Todd? All three of these are very modern productions when you compare them to the true "golden era" musicals.
You can do it, Naomi! You're...
ONLY 10 EASY STEPS AWAY FROM OSCAR!
1.) Bankrupt small, independent distributor via massive Oscar campaign. Failing that, proceed to...
2.) Cash in King Kong residual checks to pay for FYC advertisements from Kinko's.
3.) To avoid getting sent straight to VOD, attach entire film as a "trailer" to another film people actually want to see. And then...
4.) Try to do it Lahti-style and win Academy Award for Best Short Film.
5.) Avoid telling a story that everyone already knows by adding exciting details and/or gratuitous editing.
6. Carefully and patiently weather the wrath of film critics/the royal family/the tabloids/Diana-maniacs for trying to add said details. (Good luck!)
7. Find all of the boxes with "August: Osage County" screeners and slip in self-made cam bootleg from premiere screening at Lowes...the hardware store.
(Not Loews, the movie theater -- too expensive!)
8. Trick octogenarian Oscar voters into thinking that you are, in fact, a real princess. (Hey, it worked on Eva Marie Saint!)
9. On Oscar night, have camera crews come to Nicole's house, Joan Crawford-style, so you can win and keep your day job.
10. OSCAR!
I want to adapt this sequence of events and make it the centerpiece of my three-hour, tragi-comic, one-(wo)man show.
The working title is:
Fantine! Live! Dead!
You can do it, Naomi! You're...
ONLY 10 EASY STEPS AWAY FROM OSCAR!
1.) Bankrupt small, independent distributor via massive Oscar campaign. Failing that, proceed to...
2.) Cash in King Kong residual checks to pay for FYC advertisements from Kinko's.
3.) To avoid getting sent straight to VOD, attach entire film as a "trailer" to another film people actually want to see. And then...
4.) Try to do it Lahti-style and win Academy Award for Best Short Film.
5.) Avoid telling a story that everyone already knows by adding exciting details and/or gratuitous editing.
6. Carefully and patiently weather the wrath of film critics/the royal family/the tabloids/Diana-maniacs for trying to add said details. (Good luck!)
7. Find all of the boxes with "August: Osage County" screeners and slip in self-made cam bootleg from premiere screening at Lowes...the hardware store.
(Not Loews, the movie theater -- too expensive!)
8. Trick octogenarian Oscar voters into thinking that you are, in fact, a real princess. (Hey, it worked on Eva Marie Saint!)
9. On Oscar night, have camera crews come to Nicole's house, Joan Crawford-style, so you can win and keep your day job.
10. OSCAR!
It had a more classic/old timey feel than those two turds.
And no fucking shit this is modern compared to the golden era musicals. I said this had the feel of an old timey musical. I didn't say it WAS an old timey musical.
Will Oscar have Riva Fever?
What is the distinction between "golden era" and "old timey" then?! They seem to go hand-and-hand with each other!
You can do it, Naomi! You're...
ONLY 10 EASY STEPS AWAY FROM OSCAR!
1.) Bankrupt small, independent distributor via massive Oscar campaign. Failing that, proceed to...
2.) Cash in King Kong residual checks to pay for FYC advertisements from Kinko's.
3.) To avoid getting sent straight to VOD, attach entire film as a "trailer" to another film people actually want to see. And then...
4.) Try to do it Lahti-style and win Academy Award for Best Short Film.
5.) Avoid telling a story that everyone already knows by adding exciting details and/or gratuitous editing.
6. Carefully and patiently weather the wrath of film critics/the royal family/the tabloids/Diana-maniacs for trying to add said details. (Good luck!)
7. Find all of the boxes with "August: Osage County" screeners and slip in self-made cam bootleg from premiere screening at Lowes...the hardware store.
(Not Loews, the movie theater -- too expensive!)
8. Trick octogenarian Oscar voters into thinking that you are, in fact, a real princess. (Hey, it worked on Eva Marie Saint!)
9. On Oscar night, have camera crews come to Nicole's house, Joan Crawford-style, so you can win and keep your day job.
10. OSCAR!
I haven't seen The Phantom of the Opera, but Sweeney Todd was a hell of a lot more interesting and compelling than this. But, then I like that source material a lot more. Also, as much as Johnny Depp was criticized for not being a great singer, he was 10 times better than either Jackman or Crowe. I still can't get over what a disappointment Jackman was.
I mean...I just...
What?
They are interchangeable. Anyway. Just in case there was confusion...this felt like an oldie as much as a modern musical film could.
Will Oscar have Riva Fever?
I think this is right. Every look, tear, inflection felt overly calculated. It was just too obvious and forced. What was supposed to feel organic and perhaps spontaneous felt over rehearsed and overdone. I was rooting for her, and she no doubt felt the enormous pressure to succeed, but - sadly - it never came together for me in a truly moving or compelling way. With that said, I actually thought she sounded very good.
I don't get the Jackman vocal hate. I just don't.
Will Oscar have Riva Fever?
his was really pushing it in his upper register, he sounded really thin and you could tell he was trying to force it.I don't get the Jackman vocal hate. I just don't.
His voice sounded thin and weak and never really believably conveyed the emotion that it was supposed to. Plus, this talk-singing got really old, really fast. Sing the damn song! Crowe was worse, but I didn't expect much from him.I don't get the Jackman vocal hate. I just don't.
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