My Thoughts on a Movie Half a Decade Old and Other Recent Adaptations
I recently watched both the 2012 movie adaptation and a recent amateur production of the Les Misérables musical. I was only somewhat familiar with the story beforehand so I went in with only some knowledge of the period of French history this took place in and the events of the story.
MOVIE
OVERALL
The movie has some issues, from the hurried and wooden line delivery to the off-tempo leads, but that’s not to say it’s without merit. Hugh Jackman and Russell Crowe, while not the on-time singers they do have the physicality to make their roles believable. And while the line delivery leaves a lot to be desired, it along with the rearranging of the songs helps to make the story more understandable. My only other gripe with the way the movie presented the story is the lack of Paris. You see bits and pieces of it but at no point does the city feel important to the setting or plot. This is disappointing as the sets and costumes you do see are well done and seem period accurate, with a few exceptions.
Javert
Russell Crowe’s Javert is almost entirely without emotion. This choice helps play into Javert’s stern and unyielding personality it never goes far enough to make him seem like the force of justice he claims to be. On top of that the movie does try to humanize him through a small scene after the death of Gavroche, which runs counter to everything they had done before.
The movie foreshadows his eventual figurative and literal fall by having him walk on every available edge in all of the scenes he’s in and while it’s heavy handed I do appreciate it a great deal.
Valjean
Hugh Jackman’s portrayal of Valjean is one of the weaker performances in the movie. He is able to pull off all of the spoken parts of the character very well but when it comes to singing it is very hit-or-miss. Like Crowe he has a problem staying on tempo and even on key, this is then made worse by his constant use of vibrato in nearly all of his songs.
Thénardiers
The Thénardiers were a very pleasant surprise. They were a great source of comic relief in what is otherwise a very dour and depressing story. The silly accents and costumes they’d use to trick fools were fun. “Master of the House” is easily my favorite song from the entire musical because of the way they handled it.
Jean Maximilien Lamarque
An important figure in the story we never see because he dies off screen of cholera which is sad and sucks. He was a man of the people, I’m sure he would have loved another rebellion.
AMATEUR THEATER PRODUCTION
OVERALL
As this was an amateur production with a limited budget I can’t complain about the sparse re-used sets or the lack of the big set-pieces that the movie had. There were some issues in regards to the set transitions and having proper lighting at all times. Without the additional spoken lines of the movie the plot seemed to sometimes happen without really explaining why things were happening. The music, while lovely, didn’t stray from the norm for Les Misérables.
Javert
Javert is much more emotive in this, allowing his inner conflict about Valjean’s fate much more apparent. Though it also makes him seem like a man more controlled by his emotions than someone sure of their convictions and duty to the law.
Valjean
Valjean was performed admirably. Like Javert he was able to get his feelings across much better than Hugh Jackman was, though he lacked the frame and stature to make a convincing ex-con that has been hiding and on the run for 18 years.
Thénardiers
I still enjoyed the Thénardiers in this production though Monsieur Thénardier was also doing a fake accent that made him very hard to understand while singing. Madame Thénardier got more time and lines but wasn’t as animated as the Monsieur so she wasn’t as memorable though she was much more legible?
OVERALL THOUGHTS ON LES MISÉRABLES AS A MUSICAL
The Bourbon Restoration and the subsequent revolutions and rebellions are an important and interesting time in French history that doesn’t seem to be as explored as the big French Revolution of 1789 so I’m glad that the musical was made, even if it removed a lot of the political elements from the original novel in favor of telling a more personal story about redemption and love, familial and romantic.
