Quote by Lauradj

Quote by DamonX


I think Les Miserables is one of the best novels ever written. The musicals are fine but they don't really capture the essence of the book. There was a movie in 1998 starring Liam Neeson and Claire Danes that was acceptable, but it was hard for all the nuances of such a massive novel to be crammed into a 90 minute film.

This new mini series made by BBC is great. Great acting. Good production value.

The only negative thing I can say is that for some reason they have cast actors of different races in various roles. Now I'm all about diversity, but this is ridiculous. They made Javert a black guy. Ok. After reading a bunch of racist comments and reviews I actually did a little research to see if it was actually possible to have a black police inspector in early 19th century France. The chances are unlikely.

As a creative person I prefer adherence to the source material.

As a history buff I prefer historical accuracy.

The show then casts Thernardier as a Pakistani man. His wife is white, and their daughter is inexplicably black.

We live in a world where Sarah Paulson wrote using her left hand when she played Marcia Clark in the OJ show. That is attention to detail goes above and beyond. That's something that nobody in the world even noticed or cared about.

Race bending when used as artistic license is fine, such as Hamilton or the various incarnations of various Shakespeare plays. But this isn't a "re-imagining" or of Les Miserables. It doesn't ruin the show for me... I still think it's the best representation of Les Mis that I have seen. And if it does ruin the entire show for you, then you probably have some deeper issues you should attend to.

As a final critique, BBC... you need to hire some new art directors. Your promotional posters are absolutely terrible. Every promotional poster you have is just a picture of the cast standing and staring at the camera like a group of 8 year olds on picture day. It looks cheap and uninspired.