5 things you can do instead of watching ‘Les Miserables’

MANILA, Philippines - Tom Hooper’s Les Miserables is actually 160 minutes of nauseating camerawork, ridiculous singing (mostly from Russell Crowe), and relentless showboating. While Anne Hathaway, Hugh Jackman and Eddie Remayne give strong performances, Hooper’s celluloid adaptation desperately underscores the faults of any musical transition to screen. A good director would have given the material a smooth transition to film but Hooper made the story of Les Miserables seem stilted and episodic. A telling sign of this fault is Hooper’s lack of an Oscar nomination in the Best Director category.

There is no doubt Les Miserables will make you cry. It has its moments, such as the succession of On My Own, One Day More and Do You Hear The People Sing which reminds us how sweeping the material truly is. But these scenes, like Hathaway’s I Dreamed a Dream, just leave a void as the rest of the film trudges along. The novelty of on-set recording gives room for actors to fully flesh out the emotional requirements of their roles, something that worked to Hathaway’s advantage, but it can only do so much for a film where the camera spends much of its time swaying like a drunken man in an Irish pub (and this comes from a guy who actually likes watching found footage films).

If you are still deciding whether you should or should not watch Les Miserables this weekend, here are five alternative things you can do instead. Or if you watched it already, you can consider these as “cures,” as David Denby of The New Yorker would put it, from your nosedive into Tom Hooper’s misguided ego trip.

Watch Les Miz’s 10th anniversary concert on YouTube

While the concert and the film are two different productions, you can’t help but feel the need to wash away the filth of Hooper’s film by listening to some actual singing. Les Miserables is above all a musical whose songs have made their mark on generations of people and a film adaptation is an opportunity to translate its grandeur on screen. Hooper made Les Miserables seem like an atrocious exercise in audacity.

Karaoke with your friends

I recommend this for people who plan on singing along with the film. No one wants to hear your falsetto, no matter how good you are. Even if you’re Charice or Lea Salonga (well, no, Lea can definitely sing along if she wants to. She can even sing Russell Crowe’s parts. Maybe that will make the film bearable; singing along during the movie is just plain rude. This is no exaggeration; there are actually people who did this in some screenings. There should be a warning tacked up in front of the theater: “People who sing along with this movie will be clubbed with paperback copies of Victor Hugo’s novel.”

Follow @Michael_Haneke on Twitter

 The other much-talked-about Oscar-nominated film is Michael Haneke’s Amour (no, Zero Dark Thirty is not just merely being talked about, it is being debated), a story of an old couple dealing with the repercussions of a stroke. It might seem very Maalaala Mo Kaya on paper, but this is directed by a guy who made films about a family being murdered, twice (Funny Games and its US remake), voyeurism (Hidden) and a young man’s relationship with his masochistic piano teacher (The Piano Teacher). Just as Amour gained enough buzz for the Oscar season, a parody Twitter account of Haneke surfaced online, becoming a barometer for the hype and glitz surrounding the hoopla of the Academy Awards. He takes jabs at Ben Affleck, the Kardashians (he called their house a brothel), and Terrence Malick. His best tweet yet: “@benaffleck ru coming 2 ang lees sleepover at the wkend? o wait, just rememburd its for oscar nominees only. my bad lol.”

Have an Anne Hathaway marathon

Let’s face it, Anne Hathaway is the film’s saving grace. So if you’re just in it for her performance, watch her entire filmography instead and marvel at her career trajectory, from her days as Amelia Mignonette Thermopolis Renaldi, Princess of Genovia to her prestige film years (Oscar-worthy performance? Rachel Getting Married). Maybe watch her recent Saturday Night Live appearance, too, where her opening monologue is a parody of One Day More performed with the SNL cast. Oh, watch her do an impression of Claire Danes in Homeland, too.

Play a â€˜Les Miserables’ drinking game

If you’re still persistent about watching the film (maybe you’re curious as to how bad it is?), you and your friends should go to the theater in costume armed with a couple of drinks (maybe two liters of soda each) and whenever someone in the movie sings off-key, speaks in a cockney accent or has a close-up, you all drink a glass of Coke (or whatever). By the end of the film, you’ll be bloated like one of the singing extras but without the urge to burst into song or a happy ending. There, that’s the whole Les Miserables experience for you (by way of Tom Hooper).

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