Created an account to review this because I was baffled at the amount of high ratings

Rating: 3/10 (15 January 2018)

I disliked this movie very much. Maybe I'm not the right demo, maybe I'm too critical but my god this film was not good. As I'm going through these reviews on here, I see so many high ratings. And that's made me very mad so here I am writing my first review on IMDB. If you liked this film, you might want not want to read below because I am going to shred it to pieces.
But I did give this film 3 stars and not 1, and that's because of the performances and cinematography. The actors did a great job with what they were given, the best of them for me was Keala Settle as the bearded lady. Even the child actors were pretty good. But it's too bad that what they were given was awful. And some of the shots were really pretty and unique (Zac Efron's and Zendaya's duet on the ropes) so I'll give them brownie points for those things. Now to the things I didn't like.
The biggest downfall was that the pacing was all off. There were too many story lines trying to be told and I felt that nothing ever got resolved by the time the credits rolled. Example: During the middle of the film (just before 'This is Me') it was revealed to the troupe that P.T (Hugh Jackman) didn't care about his talent anymore because he didn't want to tarnish his reputation and appeal. Near the end of the film the troupe says something along the lines of "You cared about us and took us in." WHAT A LOAD OF BS. He abandoned them for fame and riches and this was never addressed in the film ever again. There's were a few examples like this but that one annoyed me the most.
Next was the characters and script. So bloody 2 dimensional. The characters felt so fake and I didn't connect with any of them. There were no real character journeys we went through, no inner turmoil of P.T and everyone felt so airy. Now, the script. A story needs to have tension, stakes, conflict. What this film had didn't even come close to any of those things. As I've said, the pacing was everywhere and too many plots were rolling around in the bag.
My last gripe is the music and FX. This film was set in the Victorian era when the Queen was young, so I'm guessing 1840's? Why the hell they decided on doing pop rock music I'll never know. It didn't fit with the era of time at all, by the middle of the opening song I was uncomfortable. Yes, the music was good but it didn't fit within the film. Quick note of the FX, it was very noticeable. Some examples were the white sheets being lifted up into the sky during the Hugh x Michelle number, the ELEPHANTS DURING THE FINAL SHOW/PERFORMANCE. Not to mention near the end P.T came up riding on one for his daughter's recital and remember audibly groaning in the cinema.
Be realistic movie! A musical can be enjoyable, heartwarming and fun, but it also has to be realistic. And the bottom line was that this film didn't make sense.