Pun Salad

A big, big movie weekend at Pun Salad Manor. We started off with Les Misérables, which won three Oscars, and was nominated for five more, including Best Picture. It's based on a book by Victor Hugo that I've actually read in the dim past, and it made me recall the comments Pastor Ellison made on the sermon notes I was required to submit as part of my Lutheran path to Confirmation: "You got the high points!"

As you might have heard, the movie is actually based on the play, which was a musical. And it's one of those "sung-through" musicals where actual dialog is rare. The movie keeps that characteristic, but (unlike many play adaptations), there's otherwise no sign that this was, or ever could be, a production that fit on a relatively dinky stage.

Anyway, the plot: Jean Valjean (Hugh Jackman) is released from hard-labor inprisonment (for stealing the famous loaf of bread to feed his starving sister and her family); wretched circumstance nearly forces him to resume a more serious life of crime, but a kindly churchman sets him on the path to spiritual righteousness. Unfortunately, he remains in legal jeopardy, breaking his parole, which sets Inspector Javert (Russell Crowe) onto his trail.

But Valjean avoids Javert long enough to assume a false identity, becoming a factory owner, and mayor of a small town. There he unwittingly dooms a downwardly-mobile French lass, Fantine (Anne Hathaway); in redemption, he takes on responsibility for Cosette, Fantine's illegitimate daughter. But Javert picks up the scent again, and Valjean and Cosette make off to Paris…

So anyway, it's epic. Unfortunately, too many of the songs are lame. Two three-named actors, Sacha Baron Cohen and Helena Bonham Carter play the Thénardiers as comic buffoons; this will jar anyone who's read the book, but it kind of works.