Dreamgirls: Not so dreamy
January 25th 2007 07:20
Dreamgirls is a broadway musical adapted to screen after more than twenty years and like all such adaptations, it came with a dismissive anxiety about whether musicals can be still trusted as viable movie vehicles. I like musicals and I constantly wonder at a culture which has forgotten to sing.After all, song is the first form of creative expression but that fact is given short shrift in the age of reality tv and docudramas. If a character breaks into a song in the middle of a dialogue, we get embarassed. We need more reality than that.
I like musicals in priniciple. That is why when Dreamgirls opened to rave reviews, I waited to watch it with patient excitement. I had read all the reviews , dutifully saw the Jennifer Holliday video, to be prepared to compare it with Jennifer Hudson's performance and educated myself on the history of motown and Supremes. But, the movie came as a definite disappointment.
The problems with the movie is its director Bill COndon who earlier adapted Chicago for the screen and helms a movie for the first time here. He is one hell of an inexperienced guy. He places stunning song sequences in awkward areas nearly killing them. The much talked about And I Am Telling you I am not going was set in the make-up room in the Broadway show, but here it is placed on the main stage making it very awkward for Jennifer Hudson to bring out the same emotion. The movie has potential for drama, heartbreak and redemption but none of it shines through the maudlin presentation. The director cuts from scene to scene before the emotional impact from any scene could be fully extracted. It becomes a particularly bad parody of a musical; a movie where there are only songs and whatever story there is, is rushed over. That's a tragedy because there is a good story to tell. Neither does it help matters that the political commentary that Condon forces into the movie is strident and feels contrived.
Jennifer Hudson can sing well, there's no doubt about it. When she sings, she and the auditorium comes alive. But, in acting department she is definitely a fish out of water. Beyonce Knowles looks stunningly pretty and acts well too. I thought Eddie Murphy was too overrated and Jamie Fox quite inadequate for somebody of his billing.
| 81 |
| Vote |
subscribe to this blog
Comment by Ash
Flashes of memories
Comment by postmoderncritic
Postmodern Critic
Relativity Watch
Padsoc
I was so underwhelmed by this that I walked out somewhere in the middle... a few of the ppl in my theatre cracked up during the 'heightened conversation' before AIATY...
Here's a parody or two you might like.
Epiphanie