The Greatest Showman (2017) Review

Directed by

Michael Gracey

I hate critics sometimes, especially all the sites now that accumulate all relevant reviews and process it down into a simple number.  Sure, it is nice to have a simple, concise way of determining whether a film has quality or not, but some films are so much more than a number.  This is how I feel about The Greatest Showman.  Rotten Tomatoes has The Greatest Showman listed at a 55%, what is considered a rotten score.  Metacritic lists it even lower at a 48.  However, the Audience Score on Rotten Tomatoes lists it at a 90%, and the IMDb user score is at 8.0/10.  So which numbers do you believe?  Who is right, the critics or the average moviegoer?  Surprisingly, the answer for this film is both.

The Greatest Showman is a passion project for star Hugh Jackman, trying to get this film made since 2009.  He stars as P.T. Barnum, a man who changed his stars, taking himself from the son of a tailor to the ringleader of the "Greatest Show on Earth."  He navigates through the story with his wife Charity (Michelle Williams) and a cast of circus folk (Zendaya being the most notable among the group).  Zac Efron enters the story partway through as a business partner for Barnum.  There isn't much to the story.  Barnum risks everything on a hunch that people will pay to see the odd an unusual, and the bet pays off.  As time goes on, he begins to lose sight of what was important in the first place and has to find his way back and make things right.  The plot is nothing special or original in any way.

With a cast like this, it is only appropriate that they made this into a musical.  This music is very modern and sounds like something you could hear on the radio today.  At times it feels very mismatched with what you are watching since this story takes place in the days of horse and buggy.  Jackman goes pop for the first time in his career.  Efron reminds everyone for the first time since High School Musical that he can sing.  Williams and Zendaya (capping off an impressive breakout year) also show their vocal ability.  Rebecca Ferguson, playing the world-renowned vocalist Jenny Lind, gives an obviously dubbed performance of her lone song.  The music is fun and catchy, but an overuse of auto-tuning took all the feeling and emotion out of the performances.  Every song ended up sounding the same because there was no difference in the vocal styles.  Why have such talented singers if you are going to auto-tune all the talent out of their voices?  They even took all the vibrato out of Hugh Jackman's voice (actually that might have been a good thing...).

There is a good amount of music, however at only 105 minutes, the film leaves no time for plot and character development.  Everything feels rushed, except the musical numbers.  There are entire character archs that take 5 minutes to tell because that is how long they could give between musical numbers.  There is a reason most musicals push 2 and a half hours.  The music forces the story to take longer to tell.  This film didn't do that.

So there is an unimaginative, vanilla plot that is rushed throughout the film to get to music that is ruined by auto-tune.  This is why the critics don't like it.  However, like I said, this is a two-sided story, and I am on both sides of the fence.  Why did the audiences like it?

P.T. Barnum's entire philosophy in starting his circus was creating a show that would leave his audiences smiling.  There really wasn't much to it.  Several times throughout the film, especially while he is interacting with a certain theater critic, they discuss how his show is going for cheap laughs and has little substance ("Does it bother you that everything you are selling is fake?").  Barnum's reaction is always that people leave happier than they were before they came ("Do these smiles seem fake?").  I feel this film tried for the same effect.  It didn't really try for anything special, but it is hard to argue with the fact that is was a fun 2 hours at the movies.  The music, although overly auto-tuned, is extremely catchy and fun.  I have been humming the songs for days.  The storyline, although basic, rushed, and unimaginative, works for the context of the film.  It is as if they made a film about P.T. Barnum's circus that held to the same principals as the show Barnum created.  Give the audience something that will put a smile on their face.  Even the auto-tuned music puts a glossy finish on the songs that would make Barnum proud.  This is why audiences love it.

So which voice do I listen to?  With as many films as I have seen, it is hard to tune out the critical voice in the back of my head that is constantly reminding me this is not high quality filmmaking.  At the same time, the average moviegoer in me is speaking up saying the experience of seeing the movie was too fun to ignore.  Would I see it again?  Probably.  Quite the conundrum...

I like to be an optimist when I can.  This film shouldn't get any Oscar attention (except for maybe some Original Song consideration).  However, if you are looking for a good 2 hour escape to the movies that will leave a smile on your face, The Greatest Showman is definitely worth the watch.  Just leave your critical hat at the door.

Rating:

3 stars

Watch the trailer here:

The Wolverine (2013) Review

Directed by

James Mangold

If you could give one type of film that has defined 21st century summer blockbusters (other than maybe Harry Potter), the answer has to be superhero movies.  I believe every year so far this century has had at least one blockbuster superhero movie define its summer season.  The majority of these superhero films have come from the Marvel universe whether it is Spider-man, Iron Man, or all of them together in The Avengers.  The franchise that really jump started this resurgence in superhero movies was X-Men.  Many will want to say Spider-Man or even Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight Batman saga, but X-Men came first and also has the most installments of any superhero franchise since 2000.  The Wolverine is the sixth X-Men movie since Bryan Singer started this run in 2000.  When you start making this many installments in a series, there is bound to be a clunker at some point.  All the great movie franchises have them.  Batman had Batman & Robin, The Avengers squad had Thor, Spider-Man had Spider-Man 3, James Bond had Roger Moore.  It happens.  For the X-Men franchise, The Wolverine is its clunker.

The ageless Wolverine is once again portrayed by the ageless Hugh Jackman (seriously, go back and look at Hugh in the original X-Men ... he looks exactly the same).  Jackman is also the only actor to appear in every X-Men movie to date.  This is the second film focused primarily on this character, and while the first, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, discusses how Logan became who he is now, this film acts as an update on the titular character after the original trilogy.  SPOILER ALERT - THIS FILM GIVES AWAY IMPORTANT PLOT POINTS FROM THE ORIGINAL TRILOGY.  WATCH THE FIRST THREE FILMS BEFORE WATCHING THIS ONE.  Following the completion of the first three films, Logan goes into hiding in Alaska, haunted by many events in his past.  While there, he is found by a Japanese girl who was sent by Yashida, an old Japanese man Logan had saved from the Nagasaki bombing in World War II.  Yashida became a wildly successful businessman, but is now on his death bed and wanted to say goodbye to the man he owes his life to.  So Logan flies to Japan and learns there is a way to reverse the effects of his mutation, stop healing, and eventually grow old and die in peace.  Unsure if he wants to go through with it, the situation is forced on him by the villain (another mutant).  Logan is then forced into action without being able to heal as he is used to doing while protecting Yashida's granddaughter from a clan of ninjas.

The makers of this film were not very forthcoming about the plot of this movie.  You really did not get much of the plot from the trailer beyond Wolverine loses his healing at some point.  I think the reason for this is so many things about this plot scream bad movie.  Seriously, Wolverine in Japan being chased by ninjas?  What about that concept sounds like a good idea? That's like putting John McClain in Russia (wait ... they did that...). Then Wolverine is forced to ask himself the question that is becoming more and more cliche and overdone: "Who am I?"  Every superhero franchise has forced their lead to have this crisis of faith, and it is getting old.  Then, as if it couldn't get any worse, every 15 minutes Logan has a dream sequence that allows him to have conversations with a dearly departed "friend."  Honestly, if you asked me the secret formula on how to put together a flop, this film seems to have every quality I would list.

With all that said, the film wasn't horrible.  It sure tried to be the worst movie ever made, but it just has to settle for the worst X-Men movie to date.  I can't say it was too terrible because at its center is still one of the more interesting lead characters of all the superhero films.  One of the reasons for this is, more than any other superhero, you can't really call Wolverine a hero.  He doesn't want to be a hero.  He just wants to live a normal life.  Only when it gets personal is the Wolverine forced to save the day.  Sure, he ends up helping save the world at times, but he has to be begged.  He is the reluctant superhero.  That makes Wolverine's crisis of faith actually an interesting question.  If handled better and in a different setting, this topic could have made a remarkable movie.

Although this is far from a great film, fans of the X-Men series will still find The Wolverine a worth-while watch for several reasons.  Not only does it advance the story of the X-Men universe, but it drops some great hints at the next X-Men installment, X-Men: Days of Future Past which is due out next summer.  It has been announced that this new film will combine the cast of the original trilogy (Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellan, Halle Berry, etc.) with the cast of the First Class prequel (James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, etc.).  With the quality of these films (The Wolverine excluded) and the great casts being merged, this has become one of my most anticipated films 2014.  So if for nothing else, see The Wolverine to get a glimpse at what is to come, but save your money.  Wait till you can netflix it.

1.5 stars