It's no secret to those that know me that Les Miserables is one of my favorite novels of all time (I guess I just have a thing for socially conscious doorstoppers about poverty, nobility, revolution and the ultimate impossibility of redemption).
Of course, due to that doorstopper-iness (tots a word), it's basically un-filmable. So I'm more than a little interested in seeing the movie musical version. Though the trailer focuses on Fantine, what strikes me most is how this is the role Hugh Jackman was born to play.
Amanda Seyfried seems perfect for Cosette, and Hathaway's singing is more than competent. As for the boy? Marius was my first great love, and I've long given up on any movie portrayal matching the image in my head. At least Eddie Redmayne has the requisite intensity.
Share your thoughts below!
I'm always hopeful that a major studio will figure out how to manage to make a big screen musical work. I do recall that ALW's "Phantom of the Opera" didn't exactly explode at the box office, but this may be a much better fit for the Holiday-season movie going public looking for something that the adults can enjoy and at least the high school kids might tolerate thanks to both the decades of marketing of the musical, and the actual content of the story. Plus, the production design in the trailer appears quite remarkable.
ReplyDeleteI do wonder how much will depend on the odd anti-Anne Hathaway sentiment that I see pop up from time to time, but maybe that's over with now?
Anyway, that's all the spoon of sugar to get the purpose of the story across. I admit, I've never even considered reading the book or any Victor Hugo, and that's to my own detriment. I did see the musical on Broadway in 1998, and I frankly think a huge, sweeping cinematic background could do nothing but bolster the play. So we'll see.
I guess what I'm saying is: I plan to see this one.