DREAMGIRLS

Director: Bill Condon (Gods & Monsters, Kinsey, Candyman II)
Starring: Jamie Foxx, Beyonce Knowles, Eddie Murphy, Jennifer Hudson

Dreamgirls is a very successful screen rendition of the 1981 Broadway musical. With great singing and production, it remains at its heart the big, glitzy entertainment of a major musical, but the great filmmaking and acting manages to get enough story across to work as a feature film. Condon has done an excellent job with this film, but the two highest notes on the scale of Dreamgirls are undoubtedly Eddie Murphy and Jennifer Hudson (of American Idol semi-fame). Murphy's ultra high energy portrayal of James "Thunder" Early, a James Brown-esque entertainer is top notch. It's upbeat and over the top at all the right times, and actually acheives pathos when the times are bad. He's the very definition of a scene-stealer when he appears. By the way, you did read me correctly. I just wrote that Eddie Murphy has acheived pathos - definitely a sentence I never figured would erupt from my keyboard.

As surprising as Murphy is, Jennifer Hudson is even more of a shocker in this film. Even though the film is nominally centered on Beyonce Knowles and Jamie Foxx, her character is the real rise/fall/redemption arc of the story, and she succeeds at every turn. She's also quite a talented singer, I think, perhaps even eclipsing Miss Knowles. At least here she did.

As you probably already know Dreamgirls is a thinly veiled account of Diana Ross, the Supremes and the rise of Motown music. Certainly there is quite a bit of creative license, but this story more closely follows the real events than most Hollywood films claiming to be "based on a true story". Here three young singers known as the The Dreamettes (led by Hudson's belter) are co-opted by an up-and-coming producer/songwriter team (Jamie Foxx and Keith Robinson).
Their first break is as backup for Eddie Murphy's soulful entertainer, but eventually Foxx sees an opportunity to take the girls mainstream and sends them off on their own. Hudson is kicked out of the group, and Beyonce Knowles' character is installed as the lead, a shier personality but no doubt a prettier face. The group takes off with this more marketable, but perhaps less soulful mix.

Fox, Knowles and friends churn out hit after hit while Hudson crashes down into unemployment and shattered dreams. Eventually she is redeemed despite the vindictiveness of Foxx. And eventually the young miss Knowles character confronts the same domineering producer for control of her career and her life.

As I said this film works as a film, but it's definitely still a big entertaining musical through and through. As such there are big, broad, loud moments galore, where characters sing cheesy lines to each other, and songs suddenly materialize that don't always seem to fit. But by and large it all works well. It's big, glitzy entertainment. It's really fine singing and music. It's even got enough story to fill in the spaces between the musical numbers. (The music, incidentally, sounds like some amalgum of Motown and showtunes. At first thought that doesn't seem like it should work, but it does.)

This was a really fine film. The revival of the movie musical continues here in the early 21st century.

Standouts: The filmmaking, acting, and production were all quite good, butt Murphy and Hudson standout the farthest.
Blowouts: Not much really failed. I occasionally felt Knowles wasn't quite up the level of the other actors, but she was nonetheless a good casting choice as the dominated, mousy character on screen.

Grade: A-