Les Miserables: One Thread More!

[Pink Ranger]

Yeah, Eponine appearing in the stage version to guide Valjean into the afterlife is like Chewbacca appearing in Episode 3: mainly done for fan service, and also from sleeping with the director.

 

[scifiwolf]

Saw this last night. I'm familiar with the story, but not the fine details nor the musical. I knew a few of the songs, but that was about it.

The good: Anne Hathaway and Russell Crowe. While it was a bit odd to hear Russell sing, he did a great job bringing depth to an otherwise bland character. Hathaway earned her Oscar on "I Dreamed a Dream". Very powerful. The rest of the cast did phenomenal jobs as well.

The Bad: Tom Hooper, particularly the cinematography. God awful. The first shot of the movie was the best. There were decent ones here and there, but the bulk was worst than first-year film school quality. All medium-to-close shots, and no cuts during most solos. While I appreciate the focus on "Hey! The actors are singing live!" I don't think bad blocking should pull you out of the world. My wife and several others were grumbling about it walking out of the theater yesterday. Also didn't care for the pace. I think better direction or some cuts would have fixed that.

Overall, I'd have to give the film a 7. Great performances, production (wardrobe, makeup, sets), and story help bring the movie above horrible direction and editing.

 

[Drizzle]

Considering we got to see her being raped in the movie (something the stage version didn't do - her first 'customer' pulled her away and behind the Lovely Ladies, as they sang the next chorus of the song), I thought the movie left her sufficiently tortured enough for the audience to see.

Fantine wasn't raped. As brutal as the scene was, it was still prostitution.

 

[danoyse]

Fantine wasn't raped. As brutal as the scene was, it was still prostitution.

It was close enough. I've heard it referred to as such in few of the reviews, and after seeing the scene, it made sense. Yeah, she had to, but she certainly didn't want to.

 

[Doctor Jones]

Now you guys can probably answer this better than me, but I never saw Javert as a totally bad guy... or that was the point but I liked that a lot.

Spoiler

So his suicide was a bit of a downer. I mean guy is a bit hard on himself.

I was sort of hoping he'd appear at the end with everyone else though that wouldn't have made any sense.

 

[JP]

Javert is certainly not a bad guy. "There's nothing that I blame you for. You've done your duty, nothing more."

His exclusion in that one scene was a nice touch, though.

 

[Schlosser85]

I think it would have been a little weird to see Javert singing on the barricades.

But yea, that's both part of what's admirable about Javert and his doom as a character.....he's as unforgiving and merciless to himself as he is to everyone else.

 

[Schlosser85]

I think Javert's relative levels of "badness" vary a bit from version to version though.

Geoffrey Rush's Javert in the 1998 non-musical film was significantly *****ier than Crowe's, IMO.

 

[danoyse]

Yeah, Javert isn't a 'bad' guy, he just had an unbreakable code of what was right and what was wrong.

He was supposed to go after Valjean, like JP pointed out, Valjean told him, "There's nothing that I blame you for, you've done your duty, nothing more."

One of the changes I liked in the movie that wasn't in the stage version was how he tried to resign when he thought he'd falsely accused Valjean. One was that even then he punished himself for his mistakes, and the other being that Valjean wouldn't take his resignation, even knowing damn well who Javert was. It made it even more believable that when his entire sense of the law was broken later, that he couldn't live with himself for it.

 

[Schlosser85]

One of the changes I liked in the movie that wasn't in the stage version was how he tried to resign when he thought he'd falsely accused Valjean. One was that even then he punished himself for his mistakes, and the other being that Valjean wouldn't take his resignation, even knowing damn well who Javert was. It made it even more believable that when his entire sense of the law was broken later, that he couldn't live with himself for it.

Is that from the book?

Because he does all that in the 1998 movie too.

 

[danoyse]

Is that from the book?

Because he does all that in the 1998 movie too.

I can't remember if it was in the book or not. It definitely wasn't in the stage musical.

In fact the pacing of all of that was better - Javert just arriving to the town, Valjean being distracted by Javert's presence in the factory, when on stage he just walked off and left things to the foreman. On stage he rescued the man from the cart after sending Fantine to the hospital, which struck up the whole conversation between him and Javert about Valjean being arrested.

That's another reason I want a complete soundtrack. All of that Javert/Valjean back and forth was new. I want to hear it again, and it's not on the current soundtrack, dammit.

 

[Schlosser85]

Yea why is the soundtrack like a fraction of what's in the movie?

I also liked Hugh and Russell's "Confrontation". It was a case where Russell's more monotone and flat singing actually worked contrasted with Hugh's more emotional and desperate pleading. It made Javert seem like the implacable force that keeps coming, and pleas just roll off of him.

 

[Angel_Faerie]

I agree, though Hugh totally drowned Russell out most of the time. I'm pretty sure they didn't have Valjean's counterpoint during Javert's lines about being born in a jail because otherwise no one would have heard them

 

[danoyse]

It's driving me crazy. Especially when songs like Who Am I, Do You Hear the People Sing, Come to Me, and A Little Fall of Rain are left out. And I wish it included the reprise of Look Down.

They're like highlights of highlights. I'm assuming there's a full version coming, probably when the DVD comes out, which will probably being the spring, since there's a coffee table book coming out in April.

 

[JP]

I can't remember if it was in the book or not. It definitely wasn't in the stage musical.

In fact the pacing of all of that was better - Javert just arriving to the town, Valjean being distracted by Javert's presence in the factory, when on stage he just walked off and left things to the foreman. On stage he rescued the man from the cart after sending Fantine to the hospital, which struck up the whole conversation between him and Javert about Valjean being arrested.

That's another reason I want a complete soundtrack. All of that Javert/Valjean back and forth was new. I want to hear it again, and it's not on the current soundtrack, dammit.

And I loved every bit!!!

M'sieur le Mayor
I have a crime to declare
I have disgraced the uniform that I wear
I've done you wrong, let no forgiveness be shown
I've been as hard on every rogue I have known



I mistook you for a convict
I have made a false report
Now I've heard they caught the culprit
He's about to face the court

And then it goes back into a back and forth from the show... "And of course he now denies it, you'd expect that from a con..."

 

[danoyse]

And I loved every bit!!!

M'sieur le Mayor
I have a crime to declare
I have disgraced the uniform that I wear
I've done you wrong, let no forgiveness be shown
I've been as hard on every rogue I have known



I mistook you for a convict
I have made a false report
Now I've heard they caught the culprit
He's about to face the court

And then it goes back into a back and forth from the show... "And of course he now denies it, you'd expect that from a con..."

"...but he couldn't run forever, no, not even Jean Valjean."

I loved that! Goddammit, where's our full soundtrack album?

And I loved in those scenes when they first met, that Javert wasn't just a villain. You wanted that guy running your police force.

 

[danoyse]

Also...$116 million worldwide as of today.

 

[Schlosser85]

Javert is so earnest the whole movie. It makes his last scene sadder.

 

[JP]

It's driving me crazy. Especially when songs like Who Am I, Do You Hear the People Sing, Come to Me, and A Little Fall of Rain are left out. And I wish it included the reprise of Look Down.

They're like highlights of highlights. I'm assuming there's a full version coming, probably when the DVD comes out, which will probably being the spring, since there's a coffee table book coming out in April.

Gavroche's second verse is my new favorite thing EVER!

There was a time we killed the King
He tried to change the world too fast
Now we have got another King
He is no better than the last!

This is the land that fought for _______
Now when we fight we fight for bread
Here is the thing about equality
Everyone's equel when they're dead.

 

[danoyse]

I remember one of the Javerts I saw on Broadway, when he got to his last song, by the time he was singing "And must I know begin to doubt, who's never doubted all this years..." he was actually outright sobbing.

He was such a sad character, he just couldn't understand mercy.

 

[danoyse]

Gavroche's second verse is my new favorite thing EVER!

There was a time we killed the King
He tried to change the world too fast
Now we have got another King
He is no better than the last!

This is the land that fought for _______
Now when we fight we fight for bread
Here is the thing about equality
Everyone's equel when they're dead.

That part was so great! I was curious how he was going to do that part, since on stage he's always speaking to the audience. That was really well done.

And I loved that they brought back the part where Valjean arrives at the Thenardiers, with the "There is a duty I must heed, there is a promise I have made, For I was blind to one in need, I did not see what stood before me." I seem to recall that they cut that part when they started trimming the show down.

 

[Schlosser85]

I like how he sarcastically mentions the Thenardiers' "sacrifice".

 

[JP]

And I loved that they brought back the part where Valjean arrives at the Thenardiers, with the "There is a duty I must heed, there is a promise I have made, For I was blind to one in need, I did not see what stood before me." I seem to recall that they cut that part when they started trimming the show down.

That's one of my favorite parts, and I hate how its been cut out recently. This is the reason why I always listen to the Complete Symphonic recording.

 

[danoyse]

That one of my favorite parts, and I hate how its been cut out recently. This is the reason why I always listen to the Complete Symphonic recording.

That was the first CD I ever got. Half the reason I'm so excited to see Annie next week is to finally see Anthony Warlow on Broadway.

And I loved the change to it in the movie when he speaks to Cosette. In the show, I remember he called the Thernardiers away for "Now her mother is with God, Fantine's suffering is over..." part, so Cosette wouldn't hear that her mother had died. In the movie, it's him telling her what had happened, which I thought was really well done.

 

[JP]

And I speak here in her voice...

AND I STAND HERE IN HER PLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE