Grittily determined to entertain

Rating: 7/10 (27 April 2018)

The Greatest Showman wants every musical number to be a showstopper. If it were Music Man there would be no "Til There Was You"; there would just be Ya Got Trouble over and over. Everything is big, flashy, building up to a crescendo that wants the audience to leap to their feet.
For the most part, I wasn't leaping to my feet. A few songs rise above the noise, like the anthem-y "This is Me" and the zippy "The Other Side," but often my reaction was, oh, this again.
Still, the first time I saw this movie was on an airplane, and when I watched it again on TV it seemed better than I'd thought and I raised the score from 6 to 7. Yes, there's heavy doses of auto-tune, a tendency towards pyrotechnical high notes, and a preference for rhythm over melody, all reflective of top 40 radio. But at the same time, the film has some lovely visual ideas, like glittering stars on a ceiling or hung sheets blowing on clotheslines, and the sheer constant hurly burly of big moments and empty flash means that if you don't like what's happening right now, you might well like the thing that's going to happen in 30 seconds.
Call it empty-headed fun. Enjoy the few people who sing so well that they aren't noticeably auto-tuned. Accept that almost everything in the film is untrue. And enjoy it.