By: Andre
Suprapto
“Pity is the feeling which arrests the mind in the
presence of whatsoever is grave and constant in human sufferings and unites it
with the human sufferer.”
-James Joyce, A Portrait of The Artist as A
Young Man
Vito
Corleone, of Mario Puzzo’s haunting mafia novel, The Godfather; said that each man is allowed one foolishness in his life time. To my shame, I almost conducted such ultimate foolishness of a life
time by seeing the much-anticipated musical, Les Miserables, in pirated DVD.
Luckily,
good reasoning got the better of me as I was watching (in a DVD with terrible
English subtitle thank you very much) Hugh Jackman’s “A-Game” when he delivered
the heart-wrenching “Valjean’s Soliloquy” almost in one take and with
pathetic red shot eyes. I decided to stop and understood that I owe it to Victor
Hugo and to the French in general to see this movie on the big screen.
It proved to be one of the
best decisions I made in my life so far. Since the experience of seeing the
movie with the full embracing aura of the theatre was magical, surreal, and “not-of-this-world”.
As
the title of this essay suggests, out of the great performances pulled off by
the actors and actresses in the movie, except for Russell Crowe whom I think
played Javert in a rather soul-less piece of acting; I was completely mesmerized
from head to toe (and toe to head again) by Anne Hathaway’s portrayal of the
pitiful and tragic Fantine. Seeing her wearing Fantine’s pathos to her very
skin as if it were her own life story, made it impossible to believe that she
once was Mia Thermopolis, the heir to the throne of the Kingdom of Genovia in The Princess
Diaries (not that I have seen the movie).
Surely,
in overall, Tom Hooper’s adaptation of the musical that has been seen by more
than 60 million people world-wide which in turn is based on Hugo’s timeless novel
on the universal theme of suffering and the possibility of hope or redemption;
is worthy of a standing ovation as long as your emotion allows you to give.
However, amidst the almost flawless performance of the actors, the precisely harmonious
execution of the choruses, and the perfect rhythm of the scenes; it is Anne’s
Fantine that stood gigantically and was able to tie up the movie altogether,
and became the soul and the spirit of the movie.