The Greatest Showman (2017)

Let me preface this baby with the fact that I love musicals. I bloody love a good musical. When I heard our Hugh Jackman was gonna be singing and dancing, I was in. When I heard Zac Efron was doing the same, I was so in. Beautiful men singing and dancing? OKAY. It's the story of PT Barnum, played by Jackman, a showman, politician and businessman but for this film, creator of the circus. 

Now you have to give into the theatrics a little as expected, it's a circus, it's the in 1800's and not entirely awful, so they obviously glaze over some things. We follow Barnum as a poor child, working hard to get any money he can, in love with the daughter of a very wealthy family. They grow closer, have children and he wants to give her everything she had before and lies his way into a loan for a museum that turns to a circus. 

Jackman starts out open minded and amazed at whoever turns up to his flyer for unique people, then exaggerates their features. Makes the tall man taller, the fat man fatter etc. We meet some great characters, follow Barnum around as he finds different people, he appears earnest to meet them and have them on his team but it has a fine line of just wanting to catch the biggest fish to get the trophy. His seemingly opened mindedness to these differences become fueled by fame and money as opposed to curiosity and wellbeing. Something that is shown quite well through Jackman though the writing was a bit shaky on the development.

As I mentioned we don't see that many bad things considering the time and the topics. Subtly mention the difficulties that Zendaya and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II characters face, being a black brother and sister in mid 19th century. Didn't go into the real difficulties because its a PG musical but I have a feeling that a lot of young kids will watch and not understand why Zefron didn't want to hold pretty little Zendaya's hand in front of people. We also ignored how they got (CGI) elephants and how they would have been trained/mistreated in the circus. 

But that's expected! It's a fun showstopping musical. It has already gain three nominations for the 75th Golden Globes, Best Motion Picture Musical or Comedy, Best Actor - Comedy or Musical and Best Original Song. I was happy as soon as it started, though apparently I'm a sucker for large groups of people stamping their feet to music at the same time. The songs were great, well done and wonderfully choreographed. The costumes were fascinating, the set pieces large and bold. The use of CGI was noticeable but it felt somewhat forgivable due to the nature of the film being a little bit extraordinary. 

The cast hold themselves well enough considering there's so many faces it's hard to give anyone a personality outside of 'bearded woman'. Jackman was good, his wife Charity Barnum, played by Michelle Williams came across genuine with their children. Zac Efron was great musically as he can sing and dance, though I think he's a semi decent actor this character didn't quite have the development or depth for him to show off. Zendaya did well in only her second feature length, Spiderman Homecoming (2017) being the first. Rebecca Ferguson plays a famous opera singer with a high level a grace that feels almost misplaced with the story even though it really happened. 

I watched this film 7 days ago and I still have the songs in my head. A tad bit empty but a lot of fun. Wouldn't stand on it's own as a drama, the music holds this feature, don't think too hard, it's feel good. 6/10, 7 if you fancy Hugh Jackman and Zac Efron or if you're big on musicals.

CINEMATES - A