Les Miserables

To be honest, I feel conflicted about Les Miserables. Not that I have a vested interest in the musical, or even Victor Hugo's novel. I don't – I've not read the novel nor seen the musical or even heard most of the music. It's just that, as personal preference, this sort of story is not a type of which I'm particularly fond. And there were issues with the style which bothered me to the point of distraction.

As for the story, my problem is that it starts as one story then becomes a different one. At the beginning it's about Jean Valjean and Javert. Jean Valjean, released on parole, decides to start a new life, under a new identity, and skip out on his parole. Even though he becomes a respected, well-to-do, man, he must always be alert because he can still be found out and sent back to prison. Everywhere he goes, eventually Javert shows up and recognizes Jean Valjean, forcing him to run again. I really liked this portion of the movie.

But, then, the story becomes about Cosette, the young girl who Jean Valjean feels responsible for after discovering he had not come to the defense of her mother, Fantine, when she worked for him and then turned to selling herself – hair, teeth, and body – and finally dying. Not only does it become about her, it becomes about her and Marius, a young student involved in the uprising against the French government. Their romance and the building revolt dominate the latter half of the story. As it's own entity, I liked this portion also.

Jean Valjean and Javert are still there, but they're more or less reduced to secondary characters. So what's the story? Who are the main characters? What is the main conflict? I have no problem when a story eschews these conventions and doesn't really contain them at all, but when a story changes mid-course it feels sloppy and unfocused to me. I could deal with two storylines being told in unison, alongside each other, but this feels more like one usurping the other. Or as though the Jean Valjean/Javert story is really just the setup for the Cosette/Marius story. But it feels like an awfully long way to go for a set up. Of course, this is an issue between my tastes and the source material. How can I really hold that against the film when it's a part of not just a classic musical but also a classic piece of literature on which it's based? If these two stories were distinctly separate from each other, with one ending before the other begins, I'd not have a problem. But telling them as one bothers me.

For its part, I think the film tells this story (these stories?) well. It's very effective. Each time Javert shows up again in Jean Valjean's life you feel for him – he's become a good man, in the grand scheme of things he's more than made up for any sins he's committed, but it makes no difference in the eyes of the law. And while the Cosette/Marius romance is of the 'love at first sight/I don't know you but I love you/star-crossed lovers' type, it's not bad. It adds stakes to the revolt section (whether you – or rather, I – think it's necessary). Jean Valjean's turn to accepting Cosette's and Marius' love doesn't really add anything to me, it doesn't add anything to his character as we already see him as an honorable and caring man, which I think adds to my distaste for the change in direction of the story. It seems a way to force him into the revolt story.

In the end, I feel like Javert is the most interesting character. The others are, more or less, static, they don't really grow or change. But Javert, he spends his whole life chasing Jean Valjean, and when he finally has the chance to get Valjean, he saves Javert's life – Javert becomes struck by the conflict, then, that what is lawful (to arrest and bring in Valjean) is immoral (because Valjean could've just left Javert to die and been free once and for all, but didn't), but to act morally is to be unlawful and go against everything he stands for, so he commits suicide by jumping off a bridge.

As for the issues with the style, I felt as though an inordinate amount of the film was told in close-up, and often somewhat awkwardly framed with too much head room and with the faces too close to the edge of the frame. This would seem, to me, to be a result of them recording the actors singing the song live, on set, as opposed to pre-recorded in a studio with actors lip-synching to playback. That approach would seem to not really allow the flexibility of multiple takes, without the use of a multi-camera set up, because each take the actor might have a different tempo, different rhythm, different take on the meldoy, etc. With close-ups, when the actors are moving around, the frame will need the extra headroom and lead room in anticipation of them moving. But it doesn't really work well when you're not intercutting between wide or medium shots and just using the properly framed portions of the take. Plus, it seems the actors are looking straight into the camera a lot, which increases the awkwardness.

Also, we often end up not seeing the actors interacting with the other actors. You have, really, an excellent cast, but we don't get to see them working together as much as we, maybe, should. It's almost as though most of the movie was shot one actor at a time – that's the feeling I got. But when the frame opens up, such as with the “Master of the House” sequence, it's really fantastic. When we get to see two or more actors together on screen, it's good. It's just that nearly the whole movie is singing and nearly all the songs are shot in that close-up style. For me it got distracting when I realized most of it was just faces singing at me. That's a shame because it undermines the portions that were shot with fantastic style.

So, as you can see, I just don't know how quite to feel about this. I can't deny the story is big and grand and has power and weight to it. I can't deny that parts were shot really well. The music is excellent, though I thought perhaps the conversational nature the actors took with it occasionally didn't always serve it well (as though at times they weren't sure whether to say a line or sing it and kind of change their mind halfway through delivering it). Hugh Jackman as Jean Valjean, Russell Crowe as Javert, and especially Anne Hathaway as Fantine give fantastic performances – if there were no other reasons, they make the film worth seeing. I enjoyed the film, I truly did. I think it's a good film, all in all. There were just issues that I had that, at least upon this initial viewing, drove me to distraction. I suppose the best way I could put it is that I would definitely be willing to watch the film again and give it another chance because none of those issues were of the variety that make me not like it.

3 out of 5