The Greatest Showman promises a lot, but ultimately disappoints in many areas.

Rating: 6/10 (18 March 2018)

I walked out of this film disappointed. What was advertised as a brilliant musical with unforgettable performances and catchy tunes with lyrics written by none other than the academy award winning lyricists for La La Land, Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, did not feel as 'great' as it was clearly intended to be. This is due to a number of reasons that I felt prevented this film from being one of the best of 2017, one of which being the overuse of CGI in some places, particulary with Sam Humphrey's character, Tom Thumb. Sam Humphrey is 4'2" according to his IMDb page, and so naturally is very small, however the geniuses behind this movie thought it a great idea to add CGI to make him even smaller. To add to this point, the CGI in this movie is atrocious, leading to an unnecessarily strange, unpleasant looking character which the audience is forced to spend a good it of time with in the movie. In my opinion, this was very distracting and really impacted some of his scenes in the movie, making them very hard to take as seriously as they were meant to be.
Another problem this movie faced was it's development, or lack thereof, of many of it's characters. All of the 'oddities' in PT Barnums' troupe are criminally underdeveloped, which made their arc in the film far less compelling, as there are given no personalities or defining features apart from what made them 'odd'. PT Barnum and Zac Efron's character feel like the only developed characters in the film, and have some really great scenes together, including a musical number in a bar, in which I felt they bounced off each other very well. If this same level of development had been spread throughout all of the main character's we were supposed to care for, and not just the two main characters, the movie would have fared a lot better.
While the beginning and end of this movie are very fast paced and interesting, with lots of great songs that I really did enjoy, including the aforementioned bar scene, the middle felt quite lacklustre, with many forgettable songs all jammed in together, and a romantic subplot between Zac Efron and Zendaya's characters, which I felt was very unnecessary and forced. The music in this section, and throughout the entire movie, is very different from the music heard in La La Land, which was a film I very much enjoyed for it's jazzy soundtrack. The music in the greatest showman is a lot more modern and poppy, which, while some people may enjoy it, I felt was a huge step down from the music in La La Land, and really let down the film as a whole.
Aside from the many negatives I have mentioned, there are quite a few positive aspects that really save this movie from being bad by my standards. As I have mentioned before, the beginning and end are fantastic with regards to their visuals, and really give the movie a broadway musical feel, which I really loved. Again, Hugh Jackman and Zac Efron really shine here, and bounce off each other penomanally, especially in the previously mentioned bar scene. Performance-wise, this movie is solid, with some great singing, dancing and acting, which really adds to the movie's showy atmosphere. If you enjoy musicals, you will probably enjoy this movie for what it is.
With regards to improvements, I feel that this movie would have worked much better if it was told from the perspective of the 'oddities', giving them the spotlight and letting PT Barnum take a backseat as a villainous but sympathetic character. This would have avoided a lot of controversy as it would have shown PT Barnum for who he was, and would have offered a slightly different take on his legacy, which I believe would have been very interesting to see. It would also have reinforced the film's message of acceptance, which I feel wasn't done as good as it could have been.
In conclusion, The Greatest Showman promises a lot in it's opening number, with stunning visuals and incredible performances, however it ultimately fails to deliver in many areas, making it feel like a mediocre stage show written by an far too ambitious amateur composer, which is a shame, as the concepts shown in the film are quite unique and, if properly executed, could have ended up being a landmark achievement within the film industry.
6/10