I love Tony Kushner, and yet I've never seen anything of his that I haven't fallen asleep for part of it. Except the Angels In America film, which was sensibly broken up into non-marathon-length chunks. I've utterly adored every word of his I've been conscious for, and if all his stuff were produced over a 4-5 week stretch with a good night's sleep after each installment I'd want everything he ever wrote on constant repeat, but damn I cannot sit through a full-length production of anything of his without nodding off from sheer surfeit of rich language and ideas. About 3 hours in my brain just collapses, OD'd on intellect, and I have to sleep it off before I take another hit.

ICompletelyON, an interesting list of 2013 movies to look out for -- some of them sound like things to look out for in order to strenuously avoid them, but some sound rather nifty. Apparently another Buffy bit player is branching out into screenwriting, and there's something coming out at the end of the summer costarring Emma Thompson as P.L. Travers, so that's pretty awesome. And Joss is doing something with Shakespeare. I dunno. I didn't pay much attention.

Does anyone really want to see Die Hard until You Can't Die No More?

I saw Les Miserables today, and I have lots of opinions:

That scene is pretty raw. Probably not the best for the trailer, but it works in context. Anne Hathaway was pretty convincing. The only true weak link singing-wise was Amanda Seyfried, but older Cosette never really impressed me in the shows either.

It did sound better in the film that the earlier versions I heard. I still think they should have dyed Anne Hathaway's hair blonde for the role. The part where she sells her hair makes more sense if she is blonde for the time period, doesn't it?

The only true weak link singing-wise was Amanda Seyfried

I have to disagree with this - I actually thought she was terrific, and that the major HUGE vocal misstep was Russell Crowe as Javert. He literally could not hit any of Javert's low notes and resorted to speaking most of those lines. So disappointing.

I agree with Jessica on this one. Crowe was awful. He can obviously sing, but he was majorly miscast voice-wise for Javert. Seyfried's voice was as good as I remember the character being, but as was also said upthread, adult Cosette is just not very interesting.

I didn't really like Eddie Redmayne. Again, I don't find Marius very interesting in general, but "Empty Chairs at Empty Tables" usually makes me cry. Yet, it was one of the few times I didn't cry in the whole movie.

All the kids were wonderful! But I'm sad that they cut Little People They had the reprise of it right before Gavroche died, but not the longer version, which I love.

Adult Eponine was just perfectly Eponine. I adored her. The first note she sang on both of her songs brought immediate tears to my eyes.

I will say, in general, that this film suffers from the usual modern movie musical problem of the ensemble and supporting characters (made up of Broadway and/or opera singers) being much MUCH better than the main cast (made up of movie stars). Colm Wilkinson and Hugh Jackman singing together doesn't do Hugh Jackman any favors.

I definitely agree with this. I enjoyed most of Jackman's performance, but when he is acting with Wilkinson, you could see the difference in singing talent. Still I loved that Wilkinson was in it. However, when Val Jean is singing to Cosette that she'll know the truth when she dies and see's God (I can't remember the exact line), I cringed. The line sounded so off from how I am used to hearing it.

Mostly I loved the movie version, and I cried a lot.

I also saw Les Miserables today. I haven't seen it on stage and had only heard bits of the music before. OMG the tears.

So now I want the music but would like something other than the movie sound track. Any suggestions on what version I should get?

I saw Les Mis on Christmas, and I loved it for the most part. Russell Crowe was definitely the weak link, though. I love "Stars," and was really disappointed in this version. There are several places in there that really require a huge voice, and he just couldn't make it.

Suzi go for either the original London cast or the original Broadway cast.

There's also the international symphonic version, which has people from casts all over the world.

I like the international symphonic version, but be warned that the Eponine is singing phonetically. I just bought the 10th anniversary one for my god daughter. I think it is probably the best of both British and American casts.

I saw Les Mis earlier this week, and thoroughly enjoyed it. Yeah, Crowe's singing didn't do his role any favors, nor did Amanda Sefridge's. But I really liked Anne Hathaway's take on her role, as well as the movie's Gavroche and Barricade singers. My perfect album would probably be one of the London or Broadway versions for the Javert and adult Cosette (and probably Valjean, because I imprinted on Colm Wilkinson's version years ago) and the movie soundtrack for the rest. Which, what with iTunes and all, is actually pretty doable.

Suzi, I really like the Dream Cast (which, I think is what Hil and Sophia were talking about) Not least because it has the entire show, not just selections from.