REVIEW: The Greatest Showman

Directed by Michael Gracey
2017 Musical Biography
1 hour 45 minutes
From 20th Century Fox

Starring
Hugh Jackman
Michelle Williams
Zac Efron
Rebecca Ferguson
Zendaya
Keala Settle
Sam Humphrey
Fredric Lehne

P. T. Barnum corralled wild animals, freaky performers and some high rollers but whether the musical story of his giving birth to the circus will corral audiences may be up for grabs.

I have read some devastating reviews and a few fawning ones and I don't think either group is on the mark.  The real answer is somewhere in the middle.  For me, well, gee, I haven't seen too many musicals I haven't liked and I swear I've seen every American musical made from the 1940s to this day.  I can't say I wasn't entertained at some level but it is not a particularly good movie, musical or otherwise.  As my partner and I walked to the car afterwards, we agreed it was like Moulin Rouge meets Glee.  If that's your thing, you're gonna be a fan.  My main criticism is that it felt like a very long music video instead of a movie.

It is certainly not a serious story about Barnum.  A portion of his life is all we get and liberties with the truth have been taken.  No real problem for me there because, again, it's not a serious look.  In real life he was somewhat of a scoundrel but the screenplay wasn't particularly interested in going there.  

It opens with one very long song (there are several of those).  At the beginning of the song Jackman and Williams are children and by the end of the song they are adults and she is pregnant.  I'm not crazy about this when I see it and it certainly gives short schrift to their lives for the sake of getting on with the razzmatazz.

The story, such as it is, has Barnum/Jackman trying to make something of his and his wife's and two beloved daughters' poverty-filled lives.  After stumbling on his big show idea, his success is limited until he turns some folks with disabilities... Tom Thumb, a bearded lady, Tattoo Man, Dog Boy, Siamese twins and others... from forgotten souls into stars or as Barnum's detractors would say, curiosities.  

Along they way he brings on a young, rich socialite, Efron, who helps him out with managing the large show.  Barnum is able to entice the Swedish Nightingale, opera star Jenny Lind, into joining his show and she alone gives Barnum the huge success he was seeking.

Before long his marriage is in trouble, he continues to deal with a side of the public who wants to run him out of town and there's that fire.

One way to take down a musical is to decry the lack of good songs and that tactic is again taken by some.  But it is one of the aspects of the film I did enjoy.  Was there one I could not stop humming the rest of the night?  Well no, but I still found most of them pretty decent.  They come out of Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, the lyricists who gathered movie acclaim for La La Land and on Broadway for Dear Evan Hansen.  

I found it ironic that when Barnum and we first hear Jenny Lind (Ferguson) sing, it isn't opera.  Odd.  Instead she sings one of my favorite songs, a ballad, no less, Never Enough.  There is also an anthem for diversity, This Is Me, that was winning and reminded me of I Am What I Am, I Gotta Be Me, I Will Survive, My Way and all those triumphant tunes.  I also enjoyed Rewrite the Stars and the routine accompanying it by Efron and Zendaya, who plays an aerialist. 

At the same time, most of the songs seem to senselessly pound at our brains, relentlessly delivered and with such overdubbed orchestrations than one strains at times to hear the words.  

I did enjoy the cast.  This is not a showstopper for Jackman, but I don't know what song and dance man could have done it better.  Efron registers more than I thought he would and Zendaya partners well with him.  Who knew Williams could sing?  Ferguson is beguiling as Lind.  My favorites, however, were the freaky crowd who were fabulous.... particularly Settle as the bearded lady and Humphrey as Tom Thumb.

I am always annoyed when CGI is obvious and cheesy.  It is loaded here, too, and it cheapens the overall feel of a film for me.  I was not afraid of those lions and elephants at the end.  Puh-leeze.

Australian Michael Gracey is a first-time, big-screen movie director and it shows.  His résumé would include work on music videos and commercials.  He probably thinks he had his writers Bill Condon and Jenny Bicks craft more of a story (away from the songs) than I think they did but why is it that the aftertaste is one of glitz and glitter rather than substance? 

Musicals need some substance and without it, what do we have other than a music video?  Maybe they should have watched West Side Story for some ideas.  I do believe there was something here but it needed Rob Marshall, Baz Luhrmann or Ryan Murphy in the director's chair to pull it off.

How interesting that a movie about the man who founded the Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey Circus is released at the time that organization has folded its big top for good.  It is not so surprising it is released in December, family film that it is.

It's especially too bad that a movie with the word greatest in its title isn't.


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