Review of The Greatest Showman (2017) by Rebecca31 — 12 Feb 2018

After months of apparently prolonging the inevitable I was brought to see The Greatest Showman. And I use the word “brought” very loosely. The musical that every person has not stopped talking about since Christmas. The musical many people insisted I would actually like. So I almost hate to disappoint you all but I did not like The Greatest Showman. I did not enjoy it and the songs for the most part were not for me.

What better way to celebrate the birth of the circus than in musical format, starring Hugh Jackman, Michelle Williams, Zac Efron and a whole bunch of other people I didn’t bother to look up. Clearly I’m in the minority here as The Greatest Showman has done extremely well for itself. Not only has it made a huge profit but it’s also been Oscar nominated for best original song. Just because I hated it doesn’t mean it hasn’t done something right. I won’t lie, not all the songs are terrible, at least two are well written but the rest made me want to rip my ears off just to make it stop. Who knew there was an audience for the fairy tale version of P.T. Barnum, complete with song after song, auto-tuned to within an inch of its life topped off with some very questionable lip-syncing by some (looking at you Rebecca Ferguson). In a Moulin Rouge-esque style of story telling and dance numbers it soon became sickening. Not to mention the mediocre predictable story and the dodgy CGI. The songs just didn’t stop, after a while I just tried to tune it all out. Hugh Jackman was a good choice and he certainly looks like he’s having fun. There is an audience for The Greatest Showman but obviously I’m not part of it. I felt like the theatre critic in the movie, honestly he was the only character I could relate to. La La Land reminded me that I can enjoy musicals, whereas The Greatest Showman reminded me why I hate them. If you like musicals then you’ll love this but if they’re not your thing then maybe give this one a miss like I should have.