Yes No Maybe So: "The Greatest Showman"
Wednesday, June 28, 2017 at 1:00PM by Nathaniel R
A big moment in Trailerville has arrived! We have the first taste of the second annual Pasek & Paul musical / Christmas Oscar hopeful. Yes, we're pretending it's a franchise now post-La La Land. After the jump let's obsessively break down the first trailer for the Hugh Jackman party known as The Greatest Showman. We'll do it the way we sometimes do it when we're really excited about something since I maybe just watched this 7 times in a row but who's counting?
Curtains up. Hit the lights...
Rather than the typical Yes No Maybe So list columns... just each moment on that particular scale.
Maybe So
You have our attention. The clickety click of typewriters - it sounds almost musical... but what no production number that kicks off rhythmically this way?
Yes
Hugh with a pencil in his mouth and some FYC Set Decoration period work. Looks cute. Can they auction off that pencil please? Asking for a friend.
Oh No!...Maybe So?... Wait, that's a Yes in Disguise
Oh no, Hugh gets fired from the job that bores him. Crazy moustaches for the FYC Makeup period work.
Sure why not
Stars. They're just like us. Hugh is sad that his roof is leaking.
Yes
Hugh blowing out a candle. One guess as to the wish he made.
Yup, an Oscar nomination for his 49th birthday! Perhaps a second Oscar nomination for his second movie musical will convince him to stop wasting his gift. If he gave 17 (!!!) years to that superheroic mutant Logan run, surely he can give the next 5 or so to the movie musical genre. Time's a wasting for those leading man years.
MAYBE. Errr....
This is not the life i promised you. not even close.
Hugh sad at the bar. Michelle Williams playing what looks like an uber supportive and remarkably happy wife. There doesn't look to be much all caps DRAMA in this performance... but Oscar LOVES a supportive wife. Yet this bit worries me because it looks a little generic, and maybe it's too retro heternormative (happy homemaker wife and her providing man!).
Plus the bar set looks a little fake without being artificial (at least in this CGI-looking shot) It's all about style and the latter is preferrable.
YES, GIMME NOW
This is the earnest moment that really kicks the trailer (and one suspects the movie) into high gear. A potentially quiet beat (which spectacles need) but filled with old timey magic. Cue: P.T. Barnum's stroke of inspiration. Jackman's perfect face sells it.
YAAAAS
And then the music kicks in that we've been waiting for.
Look out cuz here I come...🎵
Yes
Why are shots of unfurling banners always so appealing/dramatic?
Maybe So
P.T. Barnum recruits. We'll hope that all the supporting cast members have fun bits rather than just adding visual interest to the frame. i.e. cross your fingers that the "everyone is special" bit really plays rather than being a screenplay platitude.
Every one of us is special.
Yes
Even bearded ladies are special. See also Salma Hayek in Cirque du Freak and Kathy Bates and Kathy Deitch in American Horror Story (Bearded Ladies have made quite a comeback in pop culture, haven't they?!)
...and nobody is like anyone else.
Yes²
Love the shot of the siamese twins flip but too quick to screencap.
Ready? Showtime.
YES PLZ
Hugh's megawatt smile & contagious excitement. gaaaah *melts into puddle*
Yes with Some Nervous Trepidation
Hugh and Michelle dancing in moonlight. There are quite a few glimpses of this number in the trailer so it better be a romantic doozy and they better have great chemistry. It's obviously Michelle Williams's big 'prove you belong in this genre' scene.
NO
But this sequence. Can this movie possibly get out from under Moulin Rouge!'s shadow when it seems to be borrowing so liberally? If this right here is actually the first shot of the young leads falling in love and it involves slo-mo and him seeing her for the first time while she's on a trapeze we have some plagiarism problems, don'cha think?
Maybe So
This shot seems to indicate that Michelle & Hugh were childhood sweethearts and we get a flashback. We'll excuse their 12 year age difference, then. At least it's not 20!
I make no apologies. This is me. 🎵
Yaaaas Queen²
Hugh Jackman silhouette strut is EVERYTHING.
That bearded lady pivot with cleavage is EVERYTHING.
OMGSOEXCITEDNOW *HEAD EXPLODES*
Our favorite part of event movie trailers is always the cast cards.
Ready? Roll Call...
Hugh Jackman is always a Yes, even in bad movies. So...
YES ON STEROIDS WHEN HE'S IN A MUSICAL.
Did you ever see The Boy From Oz or Oklahoma! with Hugh. He's just an A+ song & dance man.
Zac Efron -We wish him well but if this movie rescues him from the comic dross he's been headlining lately, he'd better make good use of the momentum rather than squandering it. So.... MAYBE SO
Michelle Williams is a superb tragedienne. But who knew that this would be an against-type move for her? YES
Michelle Williams smiles more times in THE GREATEST SHOWMAN trailer than she has in all her previous films combined.
— Nathaniel Rogers (@nathanielr) June 28, 2017
Rebecca Ferguson. Okay, so you may recall that I predicted her for a Supporting Actress nod in the "April Foolish Predictions Before We'd Seen Anything" party. I may have jumped the gun since she's barely in the trailer. But on the other hand the character she's playing could be very juicy IF she has screen time. She plays a famous diva singer who commanded big bucks and was a ruthless negotiator for her services to P.T. Barnum.
Ferguson has been fairly exciting to watch as she's been rising, particularly in Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nationso so this is a solid Yes.
Zendaya is having quite a year since she's also got Spider-Man Homecoming coming. I'm agnostic on her at the moment (haven't seen much) but she's talented and it looks like she's having fun so Maybe So Leaning Yes.
Yes
Cool guys don't look at explosions. But they *do* look at fire breathing which provides the same kind of awesome backlighting without all the violence.
Maybe So
Zendaya and Zac in love but is he dying? Have they reversed the Moulin Rouge! genders with illness? Is this interesting or a distraction from the business we call show?
Yes
Michelle Williams getting her Movie Star on in this shot. So excited to hear her sing whatever tune this is. Can The Greatest Showman nab two Original Song nominations like La La Land did? If so which song joins "This is Me" or whatever this main theme song playing in the background of the trailer is called.
YNMS Not Appicable
This is merely an insert shot of me in Hugh Jackman drag running to the movie theater.
Yes
SWOONY MOVIE STAR KISSES are always "Yes"
Maybe So
The Barnum children doing ballet? How overstuffed is this movie?
No one ever made a difference by being like everyone else.
This is me. 🎵
yes
It's only 180 days until Christmas I... I can handle...the wait. *sobs*
Maybe So
That title card shot is a bit underwhelming after all that madness. Couldn't they have added some glitter or fireworks or something?
And finally the stinger...
PHILIP: I can't just run off and join the circus?
PT BARNUM: Why not? You clearly have a flair for show business.
PHILIP: Show business. Never heard of it.
PT BARNUM: I just invented it.
Maybe So
This banter plays a bit stiff but... Oh let's be real. We're fully YES and will drink to that. If Hugh Jackman's selling it, aint we all buying?
Reader Comments (61)
Yes! Yes! Yes!. I saw Hugh in his one man show "Broadway to Oz" here in Sydney. He is a showman through and through. And if it plagiarizes/plays homage to Moulin Rouge then all the better.
I totally agree with tr. What is it with some of you people? God himself could be a star in this film, and you would find fault in Him!!! It's just a movie, folks. Brilliant actors, with what seems to be, a great uplifting message for the holiday season and beyond. Stop being so critical until you've seen the entire movie. Remember, "we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it"
Its message of optimism will be well-appreciated on its release on Christmas Day!
Strong cast (who can say no to Jackman, whether in LOGAN or SHOWMAN mode), excellent creatives, a major studio fully behind a "risky" genre -- all point to the commercial and critical success of this film. I do not know about the others - but with this trailer, I already feel like Christmas!
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OMG....wow! I can't wait! I'll be first in line.
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To the idiot that said peta should boycot this movie because “to them” this show abused animals. Are you aware of what an objective fact is? 100s of animals were abused through this circus for years. There is no equivocation, it is proven which is why it had to stop. Moron. We should all boycott this movie because it glorifying a show that took the lives of innocent, feeling and sentient animals, and made them perform under threat of abuse for the duration Of their lives.
Niki needs to try a few objective facts. Barnum actually helped begin the modern treatment of animals and gave his full support to Henry Bergh who is acknowledged as the first animal rights advocate. You cannot apply the standards of today to those of more than a century ago.
https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/05/how-pt-barnum-helped-the-early-days-of-animal-rights/525489/
More hellywood gender confusion. Bearded ladies and Aspartame from the snack bar sodas should castrate the kiddies for Christmas!
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Great work. Imperial Money