(YouTube)
Man, “Les Miserables.” For the second time in less than six months, you’ve made me almost start weeping at my desk. The first time it happened while watching the initial trailer for the Tom Hooper-directed musical adaptation. The second occurred today when a new, four-minute look at the film arrived online.
That preview shows us how the cast members sang all of their operatic numbers — including “On My Own,” a song that first shattered my heart into 87 adolescent pieces when I was 15 — live on-set while piano accompaniment was piped in to the actors via hidden ear pieces.
So should we just ball up our Academy Award ballots and chuck them before even filling them out or finding out who’s nominated? After watching this clip — seriously, listen to Hugh Jackman improv-singing at the 1:37 mark — it kind of seems that way. At the very least it’s clear that Universal Studios wants us very much to believe in the saga’s Oscar worthiness and is doing an impressive job of convincing us because. . . oh geez, who has a tissue?
Also, I’d like to note that Anne Hathaway gets a chance to explain why her voice may have sounded “weak” to some when they first heard her take on “I Dreamed a Dream” in the aforementioned trailer.
“There seemed to be something selfish about trying to go for the pretty version,” she says. “She’s literally at the bottom of a hole. She’s looking up and she’s realizing that she’s never going to climb out of this. So I just decided to apply the truth to the melody and see what would happen.”
She’s singing the truth, people. So there.
Watch below, then just take the rest of the day off since you will have lost all emotional composure, probably.
Loading...
Comments