Back in the 1800,s a young man called Phineas Taylor Barnum was an ambitious man who tried his hand at anything that would come his way. But that seemed not enough for his imagination. He wanted to excel in something the world could feast it’s eyes on. After many attempts to find his way, he put his wildest dreams into a magical reality under the Big Top world. P.T. wants to win over the affection of Charity (Michelle Williams), his soon to be wife, and give to her a promised life and show up her father who’s mind was elsewhere.
The movie opens with P.T. Barnum (Huge Jackman) in is top hat and long coat imagining those dreams standing under the roof of an enclosed building singing the first number “The Greatest Show”. This was just a quick tease of what’s forthcoming in the greatest tantalizing musical since “La La Land”. First time director Michael Gracey is off to one hell of a start in his first feature film. This movie is fun, looks real, sounds wonderful and has excellent choreography even though it reminds me so much of “Moulin Rouge”.
Barnum gathers up a few friends and freaks from around town including a Bearded Lady (Keala Settle) who belts out one of the best songs in the film “This is Me”, a 500 pound (or so) man, a trapeze artist played by Zendaya, a dwarf (Sam Humphrey) and his right hand man, Phillip Carlyle (Zac Efron) who’s main focus is for the trapeze artist. The Greatest Show is finally assembled in a delicious enchanted musical. The crew even takes a field trip to Queen Victoria Barnum is captivated by singer Jenny Lind (Rebecca Ferguson) when she sings “Never Enough”.
i am a sucker for musicals and this is on my top 10 list for 2017. And for a cost for only $84,000,000, this is a magical well shellacked film and a running time of only 1 hour and 45 minutes, this PG film is fit for all. See it in theaters December 20, 2017.
By Bob Higgins 4 1/2 stars
