dvd of the week
Based on Victor Hugo’s classic 1862 French novel about an ex-convict struggling to overcome his past (among several other plots), the musical version of Les Misérables is one of the few Broadway blockbusters that is as good as it is popular.
When Tom Hooper, fresh from winning an Oscar for The King’s Speech, was chosen to direct an all-star cast, he decided to have the actors sing during their scenes instead of lip-sync to a pre-recorded soundtrack. The result is performances that are much more intimate and much more powerful than those in any musical film in recent memory.
As Jean Valjean, Hugh Jackman has never had as great a role on film and he has never been better: anxious fear, righteous anger and deep and visible empathy. Anne Hathaway, as the doomed prostitute Fantine, is wrenching in her stunning, agonizing performance of “I Dreamed A Dream.”
It is a performance that will be remembered for decades, and her Oscar was much deserved.
