Les Miserables Movie Review (SPOILER, IT'S MISERABLE)

 Les Miserables is an adaptation of the musical based on one of 19th centuries novel of the same name. There are aspects of the film that are attractive. The cast is impressive and their performances especially from an emotive perspective especially those from Hugh Jackman and Anne Hathaway are often strong. The musical score is good and occasionally exhilarating. And the context and substance derived from a Hugo novel set in 1830s France is very attractive. However, Les Miserables is a miserable movie Perhaps because it was meant to be experienced in theatres, the cinematography and the editing are sickening and once you notice it, the film becomes a drunken hellscape. Cameras shift from shaky to slanted, close-ups to tracking till it makes you on verge of barfing. The film has an incredibly a sanitized nature and pompous glamorous set design. The scenes shift from each other at such a fast pace of set expositions and continuous emotional torment that it almost seems like a continuous string of advertisements attempting to sell the film. Maybe the film is too self-aware? Though performances are often emotive on the surface, the singing is often subpar. The cast is definitely capable of emoting like they are in a musical and selling an emotion, they are just weak singers which affects the quality of the music since the film and is very irritating since the film is almost entirely sung. We don't know much about the characters either other than he's a revolutionary, she's in love, they're swindlers etc. With some exceptions, the first 30 minutes are the best and closest I felt to the characters during Les Miserables 158 minute run time. Jean Valjean's scenes with the Bishop and the opening scene are well done and connect well to later scenes, but after that, the is mostly a disorienting cloying melodramatic slog. Maybe it was never meant to be seen on a TV screen. Look down! Look down! It's a miserable mess. Seriously this film needs a warning label for its hurl-inducing cinematography.