Movie Review: Dear Evan Hansen

 

Michael's Movie Grade: C

This movie's heart is in the right place and that can be felt even underneath its major faults. 

What works best about this movie is the main character and what he is going through. He is instantly likable and relatable. While at first I was afraid he was simply going to come off as a caricature of those with anxiety, rather than a real human being. Yet as the film moved on and he began to put more of himself on display, he began to feel more and more like a real person and it became easy to identify with him and hope that everything would work out. The supporting characters may not be extremely devolped but they are likable and easy to relate to. This movie also addresses a serious and unpleasant subject matter. While this is not done perfectly, it is never done in a patronizing way. It treats its audience with resect and never talks down to them or diminishes the seriousness of the subject matter. True there is some forced dialogue and scenes that don't work, but even in these scenes the heart is obviously in the right place and I have to respect that. There are also a few scenes that hit their emotional marks well and those scenes are worth sitting through the ones that don't work.

Unfortunately this movie has some major faults. One is the film's use of songs, which is obviously a major problem when the movie is a musical. The main problem with the songs isn't the songs themselves but the lack of any transition before the song. The best musicals make the characters singing seem like the most natural thing in the world. In this film the songs come out of nowhere. The characters are simply having an everyday conversation when all the sudden one of them begins singing. This immediately takes you out of the story and is simply very distracting. Another problem with the songs is that they are too similar. This creates a repetitive feeling and also does not allow any song to truly stand out. This is a shame because they are not bad songs. The music is pleasant and some of the lyrics are quite good. Two other major faults are how predictable the story is and how long the movie is. Anyone who has seen a movie before, will know what has to happen eventually. Unfortunately this film takes forever to get to that part. There are times when it can really drag and leave you wanting them to get to this unavoidable plot point. This can cause impatience which is never a good thing in a movie. There are also quite a few scenes which could have been left on the cutting room floor and made for a tighter film.  Despite these faults though this is still a good hearted movie that doesn't talk down to its audience.