Les Miserables

We screened this last week and I haven't been able to get the songs out of my head since then!!!

Here are my notes:

Les Misérables

UK 2012                      158 minutes

Director:                      Tom Hooper

Starring:                       Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway, Amanda Seyfried, Eddie Redmayne, Helena Bonham Carter and Sacha Baron Cohen

Awards and Nominations

• Won three Oscars, including Best Supporting Actress (Anne Hathaway) and a further five nominations including Best Film and Best Actor (Hugh Jackman)
• Won three Golden Globes (Best Film (Musical or Comedy), Best Actor (Hugh Jackman) and Best Supporting Actress (Anne Hathaway))
• Won four BAFTAs, including Best Actor (Hugh Jackman) and Best Supporting Actress (Anne Hathaway), plus five further nominations

“Like a diabolically potent combination of Lionel Bart and Leni Riefenstahl, the movie version of Les Misérables has arrived, based on the hit stage show adaptation of Victor Hugo's novel set among the deserving poor in 19th-century France, which climaxes with the anti-monarchist Paris uprising of 1832.  Even as a non-believer in this kind of "sung-through" musical, I was battered into submission by this mesmeric and sometimes compelling film, featuring a performance of dignity and intelligence from Hugh Jackman, and an unexpectedly vulnerable singing turn from that great, big, grumpy old bear, Russell Crowe.”

Peter Bradshaw

 The global success of the stage production of Les Misérables, which has been running in London since October 1985, quickly led to plans for a filmed version, with reports in 1988 that Alan Parker would direct the film, although by 1992 the production had been abandoned.  In was only after the twentieth anniversary celebrations of the show in 2005 that Cameron Mackintosh finally resurrected the idea of a film, and in 2011 it was announced that Tom Hooper, fresh from the global success of The King’s Speech, would direct from a script by William Nicholson. 

Tom Hooper brought production designer Eve Stewart and cinematographer Danny Cohen with him from The King’s Speech and also appointed Chris Dickens, who had won an Oscar and a BAFTA for his work on Slumdog Millionaire, as film editor.  The resulting look of the film, which combined both stylised and realistic views of Paris, drew its inspiration from nineteenth century French painters such as David, Delacroix and Gustav Doré, and secured BAFTA and Oscar nominations for both Costume and Production Design.

Hooper’s major innovation in filming the musical numbers was to have all the singing recorded live on set, with the performers listening to a pianist via earpieces and with the orchestration added later.  Most of the leading performers are able to sing well, with Hugh Jackman in particular having played leading roles in musical theatre.  Minor roles are played by performers who had played in various stage productions and include Colm Wilkinson (who created the role of Jean Valjean) and Samantha Barks who had performed the role of Eponine both in the West End and the Twentieth Anniversary Concert.  With almost all the dialogue set to music Hooper’s action allowed the entire cast to bring dramatic vitality to their performances.

In 2005 a BBC Radio 2 listener poll of Number One Essential Musicals placed Les Misérables at number one: in fact it took more than 40% of the vote.

 Here's te trailer:

State of Play

These are the notes for the film we screened last night:

State of Play

USA 2009 (128 minutes)
Director: Kevin Macdonald
Starring: Russell Crowe, Ben Affleck, Rachel McAdams, Robin Wright Penn and Helen Mirren

Awards and Nominations
Won International Award Best Actor (Russell Crowe) at the Australian Film Institute
Two further nominations, including Kevin Macdonald as Best Director

Congressman Stephen Collins (Ben Affleck) is leading an investigation into PointCorp, a private defence contractor whose operations involve the supply of mercenaries, when he hears that that Sonia Baker, a lead researcher in his team has apparently committed suicide on the subway. Reporter Cal McAffrey (Russell Crowe) had been at college with Collins and as he investigates the death with his colleague Della Frye (Rachel McAdams) they begin to wonder whether Sonia Baker had been murdered.

The film is based on the six part TV drama by Paul Abbott first broadcast in 2003 which was set in London in the early days of New Labour. The film transposes the action to contemporary Washington under a Republican Administration, and the need to distill the core story into two hours means that what it loses in terms of character development it gains in terms of pace. Kevin Macdonald said that it was the complex blend of fiction with journalism and politics that had initially attracted him to the story, adding that he wanted to examine the ways that societies learn what is going on in the world and the extent to which people can trust what they read in the papers. He cited a series of key 1970s films – The Parallax View, Three Days of the Condor and especially All The President’s Men - as a major influence on State of Play.

The initial screenplay was by Matthew Michael Carnahan (who previously wrote the screenplay for Lions for Lambs (2007), Robert Redford’s most recent film as director) with further contributions from both Tony Gilray (scriptwriter for all three Bourne films and writer/director of Michael Clayton (2007) and Duplicity (2009)) and Peter Morgan, who wrote the screenplay for The Last King of Scotland (2006), Kevin Macdonald’s debut feature as a director, as well as the screenplays for The Queen (2006) and Frost/Nixon (2008). Despite Paul Abbott’s role as Executive Producer he had no involvement in the screenplay.

Brad Pitt had originally been cast as Cal McAffrey, but he left the production a week before production began as a result of differences over the script which could not be resolved due to the 2007-2008 Screenwriters Strike, and Russell Crowe took on the role at the last minute after a personal approach from Kevin Macdonald. This cast change delayed production and had the knock on effect of Ben Affleck taking over the role of Collins from Edward Norton, who had to leave due to scheduling conflicts. Fortunately Helen Mirren was able to adjust her own filming schedule to retain her key cameo role of Cameron Lynne, the editor of the Washington Globe - although some UK critics wondered why DCI Tennison had suddenly taken up a second career in journalism.