Les Misérables ★★★½ (2012, Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway, Amanda Seyfried, Sacha Baron Cohen, Helena Bonham Carter, Eddie Redmayne) – Classic Movie Review 3786

In this brilliantly produced, visually stunning, astonishingly lavish movie of the incredibly long-running stage hit, a hugely impressive Hugh Jackman sings his big Aussie heart out as a saintly French sinner, Jean Valjean, jailed for donkey’s years after nicking a loaf of bread.

Finally out of that hell hole on parole, he breaks his deal and starts a comfy new life as a rich factory owner. But someone is after him – the grim policeman Javert – and he won’t stop till Valjean is back in jail.

This is Jackman’s show, no doubt about it, and he way outclasses a rather dull, one-note Russell Crowe both on both the singing and acting fronts. Though, to be fair, stuck in a much less showy role, Crowe gets on with it efficiently and is impressively grim as god-fearing Javert, the obsessed, dogged copper forever on Jackman’s case.

Not specially well cast though working her little butt off, a worryingly skinny, grungy Anne Hathaway also stars as Jackman’s factory worker Fantine, whose daughter Cosette (a sweet-looking, tuneful Amanda Seyfried) he agrees to look after as his own.

Did I say this is a musical, well actually an opera, with only a handful of spoken words throughout? It works brilliantly in the theatre of course, but this is tricky to pull off  on screen, and yet Tom Hooper, the director of The King’s Speech, manages it very nicely.

They could have thought of providing some dialogue to break up the singing on screen. That would have provided some much needed relief from the relentless singing and made a much more enjoyable movie, bit of course it would also have betrayed the purity of the vision of the stage show.

The one really mega-hit tune, I Dreamed a Dream, will have the whole audience singing along –  if we’re unlucky! – and it certainly provides Anne Hathaway’s big moment – and how she milks it! Much better is posh Brit actor Eddie Redmayne, who pumps up the volume on a regulation juvenile lead part with some sterling acting and surprises everybody with his lovely singing voice as Marius, the boy who falls for Cosette.

Meanwhile, Helena Bonham Carter and Sasha Baron Cohen try to raise some silly laughs as a greedy married couple, Thénardier and Madame Thénardier. Slack though this is, it is welcome comedy relief, for otherwise this is generally relentlessly downbeat stuff.

I thought musicals were supposed to be fun, but here it’s almost suicidally depressing as the whole swathe of grim deaths afflicts almost the entire cast. Les Mis isn’t called The Glums for nothing, that’s for sure.

I guess you’ll either love this movie or hate it. With three Oscars – Best Supporting Actress (Hathaway), Best Achievement in Makeup and Hairstyling (Lisa Westcott, Julie Dartnell), and Best Achievement in Sound Mixing (Andy Nelson, Mark Paterson, Simon Hayes), and five other Oscar nominations for Best Film, Best Actor (Jackman), Best Costume Design, Best Song (Suddenly) and Best Production Design, plus nine Bafta nominations and four wins, I guess a lot of people are going to love it.

It also won three Golden Globes – Best Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical, Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical and Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture. The Bafta wins are Best Supporting Actress, Best Production Design, Best Make Up/Hair and Best Sound.

Hathaway won Supporting Actress of the Year at London Critics Circle Film Awards 2013.

The film has no opening credits and the title is finally stated just before the closing credits.

On 27 May 2016 veteran writer Andrew Davies said his next historical novel adaptation for the BBC will be Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables but it would be nothing like what he called the “shoddy farrago” of the musical. See what I mean about love it or hate it? In any case the film was a box office smash, grossing nearly $150million at the US box office on a cost of around $60million.

Director Tom Hooper hired Eddie Redmayne again for The Danish Girl (2015). On 6 May 2016 Hooper announced he plans to film the Eighties Andrew Lloyd Webber musical Cats. Hooper directed The King’s Speech in 2010, winning the Best Director Oscar.

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 3786

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