On Christmas day, after the normal family time that comes with tearing open presents and eating an over-sized "linner" (in between lunch and dinner), we went out on a limb and decided to try something a bit different. Les Misérables, the much anticipated film adaptation of the musical, was of interest to me because of all of the hype it has received during the lead up weeks. Although I must confess I knew little about the show before I saw the movie, I was most interested in seeing what I had heard was a new method to putting a musical on the big screen.
Personally I have enjoyed other film adaptations of musicals like Sweeny Todd, Grease, and Chicago, but with each of these I was aware of the changes that the director chose to make to the number of songs and the style in general of the show. The most shocking thing about Les Misérables is that the songs are treated much like they would be on the stage. Not only are the actors seen alone and singing for long periods of time, but there is barely a single word simply spoken. The actors chosen to sing were all extremely talented and a pleasure to listen to, but this was a difficult feat to pull off. And not only did these actors have to prepare extensively, the director, Tom Hooper, decided to have everybody record the songs while acting them. Usually, songs are prerecorded and played over the film, but in this case the audio recording comes directly from when they were performing on set. This aspect, in and of itself, allows Les Misérables to stand alone as a very unique film.
While I was personally drawn in by the movie, other people who I have discussed it with have had differing interpretations. Honestly, because of the length and style of the movie, one really has to be a fan of musical theatre to appreciate the way the film was accomplished. Those who have found themselves bored or annoyed with the lack of spoken words tend to be people, at least in my experience, who didn't expect the intensity of seeing a musical on a movie screen. This brings up some interesting ideas in terms of how one converts stage performance to film and vise versa. It is important to consider how the audiences of these two kinds of performance differ and how the general techniques differ. Some thoughts for me to blog about at a later time!
Overall, though, I was amazed at the intensity of Les Misérables and especially at the talent of these movie actors to pull off musical caliber song performances.
~Julie
