Critics have a history of getting it wrong with Les Misérables and that trend continues here. The sets and locations are handled well, the period looks convincing, but the story is lame. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism. There he and the child, Cosette, spend 10 years. Les Miserables: Film Review. Les Misérables is set in the Parisian suburb of Montfermeil, where sections of Victor Hugo’s 1862 novel is set, though the movie’s connection … And the postwar sequel makes a pointed comment on the fact that some French collaborated with the Nazis, some did not, and in the postwar years justice was not always properly distributed among them. The movie's World War II sequences play like separate short stories. Liam Neeson stars as Jean Valjean, and the movie makes its style clear in an early scene, where he stands, homeless and hungry, at the door of a bishop, and says, "I am a convict. "Les Miserables'' is like a perfectly respectable Classics Illustrated version of the Victor Hugo novel. Rush, in his first major role since "Shine," somehow doesn't project the fevered ethical madness that drives Javert; he comes across more as a very stubborn bore. Books reach some readers at the very core; they influence the way their lives are lived, and the way they see themselves. It's hard to make a period picture come alive, but when it happens ("Restoration," "Dangerous Beauty," "Amistad") we feel transported back in time. Watch a clip from the movie ‘Les Misérables.’ he tells her on their first venture into the world, so of course she immediately does.) What Hooper and Co. have created is impressive in its own right, and the streamlined and insightful take on Hugo's novel opens up the story in new ways that distinguish this version. A story filled with outrage and idealism becomes somehow merely picturesque. Les Misérables is a movie that demands your attention. The result is a work that gives meaning to the word "epic." Valjean is taken in, fed and sheltered, and tries to steal the bishop's silver. Les Misérables movie reviews & Metacritic score: Stephane, only just arrived from Cherbourg, joins the anti criminality brigade of Montfermeil in a sensitive district of the Paris suburbs. The screen version demanded some reconception, some vision to make sense of its existence. MOVIE REVIEW In ‘Les Misérables’: trapped on the outskirts of Paris — and the outskirts of French society. That musical, by the way, is a long time coming. Books reach some readers at the very core; they influence the way their lives are lived, and the way they see themselves. Then Cosette, now a young woman played by Claire Danes, yearns for freedom; Valjean, against his better wishes, takes a house for them. Because the settings behind each story are so different, Belmondo doesn't resort to makeup tricks to change character, but simply portrays them, somehow projecting their different personalities onto his famously elastic face. The world of Henri Fortin, the world of Roger Fortin, the world of the Zimans, and the world inside the head of an ordinary man who, by treasuring the story of one of the great heroes of French literature, absorbs some of his greatness. Fortin is not, when we meet him, anything more than a former boxer who drives a moving van. Rated PG-13 I spent 19 years at hard labor. Thumbs up from Siskel; thumbs down from Ebert. At the Movies: Les Miserables/The Big Hit/Wilde/Don't Look Back/Little Dieter Needs to Fly/Junk Mail (1998) (TV Episode) Reviewed. "Les Miserables" is a film about such a book and reader and, because it is long and sprawling like Victor Hugo's 1862 novel, is about many other things as well. When Cosette pleads with her father to leave the convent, she sounds more like a bored modern teenager than a survivor of murderous times. It contains scenes drawn from the novel, modern scenes that parallel the novel, and scenes which, strictly speaking, have nothing to do with the novel, including a great deal of material about the Nazi occupation of France and the persecution of the Jews. It contains the moments of high drama, clearly outlines all the motivations, is easy to follow and lacks only passion. After 19 years of hard labor for stealing a loaf of bread and trying to escape his sentence, convict Jean Valjean (Hugh Jackman) is paroled, but starving, because no one will hire or help a known criminal. By Kofi Outlaw Dec 25, 2012. Lelouch, like Hugo, Dickens, Balzac and the other great 19th century novelists, is not riveted to a central story line, but proceeds in the general direction of his conclusion while freely allowing himself side excursions to characters and incidents that catch his eye along the way. This review originally ran on January 10th and is being re-run because it's now on Amazon Prime. Video: Chaz Ebert Introduces the No Malice Film Contest. The chauffeur's son, Roger Fortin, grows up to be a boxer, becomes the French champion, and later drives his own moving van. It begins in 1900 with a story loosely inspired by Hugo's Valjean, who was imprisoned for stealing a loaf of bread. What I liked about "Les Miserables" was the expansive freedom and energy of its storytelling. In the more modern version, a chauffeur (Belmondo) is wrongly accused of the death of his aristocratic employer, who committed suicide. Soul! Damn the imperfections, it’s perfectly marvelous. For Violence, Brief Language and Sexuality, Night Stalker: The Hunt for a Serial Killer, Sundance 2021: All Light, Everywhere, Users, Rebel Hearts, Bring Your Own Brigade. Valjean sells the silver, gets a job in a provincial factory and uses the nest egg to buy the factory. My name is Jean Valjean. In Les Misérables, Seyfried played the role of Cosette, daughter of the central character Fantine, who leaves her to be looked after by the Thénardiers, who exploit and abuse her. Victor Hugo's masterpiece comes to television in a six-part adaptation by multi award-winning screenwriter Andrew Davies. Stephane (Damien Bonnard) is a policeman newly moved to Paris and assigned to a unit of the plainclothes Anti-crime Squad.His partners are Chris (Alexis Manenti), a virulently racist white man whom the kids on the street have dubbed “Pink Pig,” and Gwada (Djebril Zonga), whose own African descent and Muslim religion equip him with strangely little solidarity with the population he serves. A story filled with outrage and idealism becomes somehow merely picturesque. This "Les Miserables" gives viewers a happy catharsis of sorts, followed by a chaser of melancholy, reminding us some things never change. From the wretched, toothless alley-bound masses to the blood-filled street gutters to the scab-covered, half-dressed prostitutes fornicating and shaking their “goods” under the grimy port docks, this Les Mis presents some seriously disquieting moments. Consider, in the same light, poor Fantine (Uma Thurman), fired from the factory and forced into prostitution because it is discovered she has a child out of wedlock. The film is a wealth of incident: boxing matches, prison escapes, overland chases, a train robbery, high society, low crimes. He is imprisoned, and while his family starves and his wife is driven to prostitution, the chauffeur attempts to escape in a series of heartbreaking scenes, including one in which he swims an underwater passage and climbs a well, only to have to make an instant decision about his fate. Ladj Ly's "Les Misérables" is haunted by the memory of the fall of 2005, when riots broke out in the suburbs of Paris (and other cities), riots which raged for three terrible weeks. Shot in generous widescreen and running for almost three hours, the movie is a universe with room to move around in. Here we have a dutiful, even respectable, adaptation that lacks the rabble-rousing usually associated with "Les Miserables." But he has a vivid imagination and is able to see himself as Jean Valjean, and soon we do, too, because Lelouch intercuts scenes from the historical novel, also using Belmondo. Les Misérables review – a simmering tale of two cities. There’s a great meta moment early in Tom Hooper’s film adaptation of the ’80s Broadway musical Les Misérables, based on Victor Hugo’s 1862 French novel. Movie Reviews 'Les Misérables' Review 'Les Misérables' Review. Film Review Ladj Ly’s debut feature explores poverty, policing and perseverance in a gritty suburb of today’s Paris. Read full review In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism. Eventually they are in the cab of Fortin's moving van, their possessions in the back, and Ziman has persuaded the former boxer to drive them to the Swiss border by promising to read Les Miserables to him. Starring Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway, Amanda Seyfried, Eddie Redmayne, Helena Bonham Carter, Sacha Baron Cohen and Samantha Barks. As we rejoin him some years later, he is the local mayor, respectable and beloved, trying to teach himself to read and write. 1/10 for competent directing and some lovely shots. Roger Ebert wrote he liked this film's "expansive freedom and (the) energy of its storytelling". Amusingly the more Hugo describes you as quiet and introverted, the more likely you are to begin roaring in Les Misérables (2018). More than one world, actually. It is a powerful movie that is not afraid of looking ugly, and therein lies what makes it unique. Directed by Tom Hooper. Les Misérables movie reviews & Metacritic score: Stephane, only just arrived from Cherbourg, joins the anti criminality brigade of Montfermeil in a sensitive district of the Paris suburbs. (Fortin cannot read, but once saw a film version of the story, and loves it.) "I know who you are," replies the bishop, but not before the audience has been spoon-fed its briefing. Les Misérables, 2012. This "Les Miserables" has been written, produced and directed by Claude Lelouch, who uses the legendary Jean-Paul Belmondo, now 63, in several modern roles, and even that of Hugo's hero Jean Valjean. There was a similar scene in Claude Lelouch's 1995 "Les Miserables," which intercut passages from the novel with a story set during World War II; it was touching, but this version feels more like a morality play. Instead, we're left with a film that is conscientious in all its particulars and yet strangely and mysteriously dead. Meanwhile, we meet the Zimans, a Paris lawyer and his ballerina wife, who are married in the 1930s and linger too long in France before trying, as Jews, to escape the Nazi occupation. Then fate re-enters his life in the person of Inspector Javert (Geoffrey Rush), a police official who recognizes him from his years at hard labor and wants to expose him: In this world, if you once do something wrong, you are banished forever from the sight of those lucky enough not to have been caught. And so on. The film received positive reviews from critics with a score of 80% on Rotten Tomatoes. "Les Misérables," taken on its own terms, leaves critics with nothing to do except join the rhythms of rapt silence, crying and applause, and it is understandable that they want nothing to do with it. Trying to reconstruct the story, you recall so many different faces (there are said to be 100 speaking roles in the movie) and locations that you realize a world has been created. Ebert & Roeper – The Black Dahlia, Gridiron Gang, Everyone’s Hero, Haven, The Last Kiss, 2006 June 29, 2020 Roger Ebert – The Best & Worst of the Year (2011) June 24, 2020 At The Movies Tribute to Siskel & Ebert (2009) Final show! He means it, and will never cease his pursuit of Valjean, even though the other man, as mayor, spared his job: "I order you to forgive yourself." Her father could of course settle all her objections with a few words of explanation, but in the great movie tradition of senselessly withholding crucial information, he refuses to; it must have been difficult for Neeson to maintain that expression of fearful regret in scene after scene. The movie is not an adaptation of the long-running stage musical that has its own film version announced more or less annually, so far without result. Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. Javert is the kind of man who can say with his dying breath, "I've tried to lead my life without breaking a single rule." "Les Miserables'' is like a perfectly respectable Classics Illustrated version of the Victor Hugo novel. Cosette falls for the fiery radical Marius (Hans Matheson), who is being tailed by the police, which puts Javert once more onto the trail of poor Valjean. "Les Miserables" only made me feel transported back to high school history class. Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. On my passport I am identified as a thief.'' Besides being a feast for the eyes and ears, Les Misérables overflows with humor, heartbreak, rousing action and ravishing romance. And Ziman's own bizarre adventure, when he is hidden in a cellar by a farmer and his wife, and pays them from his Swiss bank account. In the meantime, this dramatic version is by the Danish director Bille August, whose work ("Pelle the Conqueror," "Best Intentions" from the Bergman screenplay "House of the Spirits"), while uneven, has shown a juiciness and complexity. Rated R Gradually, in a transformation that is one of the most intriguing uses of literature I have seen in the movies, Fortin begins to absorb some of the heroism and liberalism of the Hugo character, and becomes a hero himself. As Javert pursues his vendetta against a man who has become kind and useful, Marius leads the mobs to the barricades, which look a lot here as they do in the stage musical. 8:00 AM PST 12/6/2012 by Todd ... against musical diarrhea and a laboriously repetitive visual approach in the big-screen version of the stage sensation Les Miserables. Valjean discovers her plight (he was unaware of the firing), nurses her through a fatal illness and promises to care for the child. An Executive Producer Recommends Three Films to Watch for Black History Month: Passing, A Most Beautiful Thing and Mr. There is the non-relationship of Madame Ziman, now a Nazi prisoner, with the German officer who fancies her, accepts her rejection, and later helps her escape. Full Review. In one of the most famous episodes from Hugo's novel, the bishop tells the police he gave the tramp the silver, and later tells Valjean: "I've ransomed you from fear and hatred and now I give you back to God." Ebert & Roeper – The Black Dahlia, Gridiron Gang, Everyone’s Hero, Haven, The Last Kiss, 2006 June 29, 2020 Roger Ebert – The Best & Worst of the Year (2011) June 24, 2020 At The Movies Tribute to Siskel & Ebert (2009) Final show! Featured in . Then there are the film’s unflinching depictions of Parisian squalor in the early 1800s. An Executive Producer Recommends Three Films to Watch for Black History Month: Passing, A Most Beautiful Thing and Mr. The definitive site for Reviews, Trailers, Showtimes, and Tickets With the unyielding Javert forever at his back, Valjean takes his money and flees to Paris, taking refuge in a convent he had once (foresightedly) given money to. "Les Miserables" is a film about such a book and reader and, because it is long and sprawling like Victor Hugo's 1862 novel, is about many other things as well. Soul. Fans of Les Misérables wouldn't have minded if the movie were different, but better, or just as effective. For Violence, Brief Language and Sexuality, Sundance 2021: All Light, Everywhere, Users, Rebel Hearts, Bring Your Own Brigade. ("Don't leave the cab!" This is the second movie made of "Les Mis" during a decade when the "musical version" has been promised annually. Reluctant to stop collecting his money, they do not tell him when the war ends. Les Misérables (2019) Movies, TV, Celebs, and more... Ly rather cleverly inoculates his film to charges of repetition by outright owning them. There is, I think, an obvious person to direct it: Alan Parker, whose "Evita" and "Pink Floyd the Wall" show he is one of the few modern filmmakers who understands musicals. Rotten Tomatoes, home of the Tomatometer, is the most trusted measurement of quality for Movies & TV. Thurman's performance is the best element of the movie. It contains the moments of high drama, clearly outlines all the motivations, is easy to follow and lacks only passion. 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