Comments on: Dreamgirls

By: Terrence M. Davis

Terrence M. Davis — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 06:31:00 +0000

That would make you forget this reinterpretation 2007 so fast your head would spin. Movie does not capture the flavor of the 60s at all. Or the charisma of the original. Totally different. You now know less than when you started. Rating: 1 / 5

By: Hoyt Harris

Hoyt Harris — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 04:11:14 +0000

DREAMGIRLS has individual parts and pieces that, when the film was announced, sounded delicious, like a winner infallible. But the parties, as good as they are, are not freezing in the knockout stages all this film could have been. Writer Bill Condon (Chicago), who also directed Dreamgirls, may have been too scattered to take it off. The legendary Broadway musical of 1981 was led by the late Michael Bennett (the stage version of A Chorus line) which has been praised for his “film” directed the original. He succeeded with pivoting on stage with lighting towers, to achieve before the eyes of a live audience what amounted to the stage version of film wipes, dissolves, lateral, and fades. His vision made for exciting work on stage as he did in A Chorus Line. Twenty-five years after the original Broadway show, Dreamgirls screen seemed like a guaranteed hit. With Chicago, Condon had already shown in his adaptation of Broadway musicals still had legs to the movie business. Not only the film version of DREAMGIRLS feature mega-star Beyonce Knowles, Oscar-winner Jamie Foxx, the veteran film star Eddie Murphy and “American Idol” reject Jennifer Hudson ( “everyone loves to root for an underdog”, etc.); DREAMGIRLS be flown on the screen by DreamWorks and David Geffen. But despite what looks like a 24 carat pedigree, the film simply falls short of expectations. The script talks about how white artists in the 50′s and 60′s songs repackaged black artists’ and style. But the execution of this point is low. (Was Hollywood fear of alienating the white audience it needed to make the film version of a bona fide office box hit?) Montages of footage of the civil rights era are the screen, but they seem to exist in another world from the action of the main scenario. Despite its Golden Globe win for best supporting actress in a comedy or musical, Jennifer Hudson is a weak substitute for the summer holidays Jennifer, who created the role of Effie White. We want Hudson to be good. But it simply has not the voice that used to sink Holiday Effie rejection and pain in the bone marrow even those privileged to see play the role onstage. Version live holiday Effie’s powerful ballad, “And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going” is one of the most powerful performance that never close the first act – or any other act – on stage or screen. Whereas version contains holidays each soul the breath of raging pain, Hudson, on some notes, goes nose, thin and strained. Let’s face it: This song was the jewel in the original musical comedy – the number of Closing the first act that threatened to blow the scene apart. Listen (Dreamgirls’ has never been a great Broadway scores. The show’s success is largely due to his technique of staging.) Without a knockout rendition of this song by climate, subsidence film – and suffers. Version Hudson gets something new impetus with the development made by the cinematography and editing. But accommodations to the live, three dimensions, does not need help. She knocked the song night after night, the theater – all of it, the orchestra and once-in-one voice of a lifetime. If for no other reason than to understand the performance of the holiday film, DREAMGIRLS has been filmed two decades before it was. If they had to use a “loser” from “American Idol”, too bad they could not wait Mandisa from the 2006 season. This girl can sing. All Eddie Murphy and Beyonce in the world can not compensate for this. Because DREAMGIRLS has always been really “on” Effie and what happens to him, Jennifer Hudson in the pivotal role that it is a copy of the fifth or sixth carbon from the same origin – but small, pale. Those unfamiliar with Jennifer Hudson holidays could find more than enough. But if someone wants to see – and hear – “Effie White”, just go to youtube, type in “Jennifer Holiday” and watch the clip of his performance at the 1982 Tony Awards show. If his performance, even on a small computer screen, with less than perfect audio with video glitches and all, do not shake you to your heart and let you know that you saw greatness, then call the contractor, because you’re probably dead. Overall, the performers in the film passably adequate job in their roles. The problem is that Dreamgirls, while “on” Effie White has so many characters and so many “stars” – each of them it is contractually committed to get their “big moment” – the movie stands agitated not unlike a mass “American Idol” audition. Just as we try to learn more about this character or plot, we whooshed Off to the next star of “many”. The film, in essence, lack of coherent flux. DREAMGIRLS Condon is an admirable attempt to turn a legendary music scene in gold on the screen. Perhaps the film could never be done without power today established black stars. But the treatment given to these stars – as new songs written for the screen – dilutes the punch the line through the original. This version – while the best you’ll get the legendary performance – is something ‘other’ than that in 1981, had an audience drawn into the backstage story of a group of girls and bumpy road, they went to pop stardom. The best acting job was turned in by Eddie Murphy, including James “Thunder” Early seems a tribute to Wilson Pickett, Little Richard, et al. Murphy shows a level of depth here, we have not seen before. While some may not “have” comedy mixed with tragedy in its execution, any person who knows the show business knows that the performers on stage persona project may be diametrically opposed to the real autonomy of a person After the end of concerts and incorporates real life. Hudson, in his first film, has the power marquee by the fans it has received before it was booted from “American Idol.” His game is as good as everyone in addition to the distribution. (In fact, who can really say? The dialogue scenes are so tiny.) But – and this is a big “but” – if she had the chops of the voice of Jennifer Holiday – which may be to get more than the sky would never allow – Hudson could do as a promising start as Barbra Streisand did in FUNNY GIRL. That, however, has not happened. If David O. Selznick in 1939 could travel the world before finding the British actress Vivien Leigh to play Scarlett O’Hara in Gone With the Wind, why not DreamWorks have done so in search of the perfect Effie, instead of taking the easy way out and seizing an “American Idol Cast-off? This was not a cynical gesture, enter top-viewers following the show very popular. Smart? Yes. But cynics anyway. If Broadway could find Jennifer Holiday in 1981, Hollywood would surely have found a stranger – with acting and vocal power – one quarter of a century later. Shame on the filmmakers to jump on a golden opportunity that will never return. The film is made. The Oscars will be won. DREAMGIRLS but not the musical, he Coulda, Woulda – but especially – Shoulda Been.Rating: 2 / 5

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 03:28:00 +0000

No Stars !!!!!!! I find it difficult to articulate the sadness and disappointment I felt as I watched this madness. . . I started EXIT THEATER twice as I that the execution of this fiasco. . . . FIRST TIME, I decided to stay, hoping it would improve. . . The second time I just realized, I sat down this long, I’ll see the exact position of train crashes and burns. . . AND THAT train crashes and burns. . . On several occasions. . . Beyonce. . . TERRIBLE BUT MY goodness, she said maybe 80 words the entire film, QUITE IN CONTROL it seems. . . YALL TOO LATE. . . We all know it IS NOT THE KNIFE stronger in the drawer. . . Jamie Foxx and Jennifer Hudson DID pretty good with what they had to work with what is not. . . The scenario was FLAT. . . Many missed opportunities to genuine dialogue. . . IF I was really interested I’m sure I could go back and have at least a dozen great lack, I am not a masochist. . . JENNIFER’S SINGING IS GOOD. . . JUST GOOD. . . I LIKE her because she is nice, BUT IT IS NOT REE-REE or Gladys, OR CHAKA or Jennifer OR EVEN Jill, OR NAVASHA. . . BUT I love him. . . JAMIE, good as the greedy, MIGHTY MOGUL, but again not much work. . . DISAPPOINTMENT DISGUSTING MOST OF ALL, Eddie Murphy in this imitation FAKE JAKE and the desecration of James Brown, ET AL. . . NI seriously funny or serious SERIOUS. . . What is it? And now rewarded for depreciating the GODS. . . EVENT OF THE TRUE Dumbing and Numbing of the American culture. . . WHAT A MESS Rating: 1 / 5

By: Happy Camper

Happy Camper — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 03:09:53 +0000

Full Disclosure: I tried to see this movie in my theater history, 63-year-old, locally because they are facing a bank foreclosure in 11 days. (If you have already lived in the city of Baltimore – Senator, with probably the largest video screen in Maryland, is in danger of closing its doors forever.) However, I did not enter the theater with hope, however light that I would leave a sense of fun! Call me old-fashioned, but I like to care about at least one of the characters in a story. Even in a backwater, terrible film I will sit through all the boring kind, so I can sympathize with at least one character. In Dreamgirls, I literally felt like I was watching a soap opera with a very heinous shallow two-dimensional characters. Who cares about a group of rich and famous losers show business? For example, after hearing a character says: “I spent half a million dollars (1960 dollars) to drink.” I almost groaned and said to myself, “as a young adult, you had nothing better to do with your money during the height of the Vietnam War and the civil rights movement, then spend it on alcohol? How inspiring! Granted the cinematography and costumes are absolutely beautiful – the reason to give this movie two stars instead of one. But it is the icing on the cake. After a while it wears out and he certainly did not carry a story to his conclusion.Cette video is flash and no substance. Although there is certainly nothing offensive in that exaggerated production, have a sense of humor, like Chicago very clever, would have done wonders for this film. Having also fewer characters, and better editing would not hurt either plus.Je is ironic that one of the songs performed in Dreamgirls was along the lines of “I’ve got soul,” something this movie shallow sorely missed! Rating: 2 / 5