Tuesday 22 January 2013

Les Miserables - DM review

I had heard that audiences were sobbing whilst watching this film. I found it overwrought and overlong and it only bored me to tears.
Now, I don't mind musicals and when it is done right it can be an emotionally moving artform (I'm thinking Cabaret, Dancer in the Dark) or just really good fun but this was dire.
I haven't seen the stage version (and definitely will not be now) and so cannot comment on the transfer to film. The sets and staging looked puny and I found the directing irritating...there are only so many close-ups of someone's face whilst singing I can see before I have enough (and I now know that is 10 minutes). And there is so much singing...song after song after song. I know this may be a silly criticism to throw at a musical but it just saturated me.
I felt like the emotional melodrama was being rammed down my throat and consequently I felt nothing...SPOILER ALERT...I even cheered when Gavroche (the irritating little urchin that had evidently wandered in from the "Oliver!" set) got shot.

OTT nonsense

2/10

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