We're your dream boys.....

Rating: 6/10 (27 May 2016)

Mr. Emotion himself, Clint Eastwood, the dude who learned about screen love at the hands of Carol Channing and sung his way into the hearts of dozens in "Paint Your Wagon", has joined an elite group. William Wyler, Sidney Lumet, John Huston and Richard Attenborough were all brilliant directors who tried their hands at helming a musical, and of the five, only William Wyler (with "Funny Girl") was successful. The remainder of them all had critical disappointments and even disasters with their efforts, and Eastwood is the latest. If his film version of "Jersey Boys" isn't a disaster, it certainly ranks as a missed opportunity.
Perfect in period detail, this is proof that not all Broadway smash hits can be transferred to the screen. Seen around the world after becoming a smash hit during the time when juke box musicals were frequently bombing, this was the musical for straight men who didn't want good and bad witches or big haired housewives from Baltimore. It's "The Sopranos" meets "American Bandstand", and that's a large target audience. In its 10th year on Broadway, it still packs em' in although not at full price anymore. The movie has a tele-feature feeling about it, and something tells me that this could have made a great T.V. mini-series with all the music intact rather than abbreviated as it is here.
This isn't as much a musical film rather than a showbiz drama with musical interludes. The story of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons is older than "Grease" (the movie title sing introduced by Valli himself), and John Lloyd Young seems to be filled with Valli's young spirit. The typical rise to success story is "Dream girls" with three of "West Side Story's" surviving Jets getting outta da hood and into the big time. Had this been introduced to film rather than stage, it might have gotten a better reception, but purists were mildly disappointed even though there are some wonderful moments.
Where this is successful is in its use of nostalgia, and that's what raises its impact for me. Eastwood wisely choose brassy colors to represent the era, and as the story develops, the color photography takes on a life of its own, almost becoming the fifth season. The gimmick of certain characters narrating directly to the camera is a bit off putting. For me, it is a valentine to a by-gone era that continues to create new fans among young audiences who get to see that the older generations were not as square as they seemed.