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Les miserables (1952) More at IMDbPro »

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12 out of 14 people found the following comment useful :-
Injustice, French Style, 27 October 2004
8/10
Author: thinker1691 from USA

Once you have seen the Black and White film "Les Miserables" with Michael Rennie as Jean Valjean and Robert Newton as Etienne Javert all others fall short by comparison. It's true, there are several versions, both American and French, but each lack the total depth of the 1952 film. Some are too long, (the French Version is three hours) some are mismatched actors, like the one with Anthony Perkins and Ian Holm, and some have forgotten the spirit of the book itself. This particular version which includes actor Edmund Gwenn is, in my opinion superb! This film encompasses the essence of Victor Hugos book. Like a fine wine which has aged well, this vintage is a true masterpiece. Enjoy. ****

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13 out of 18 people found the following comment useful :-
The Best Version of Les Miserables, 23 July 2002
10/10
Author: (steve_howard84@yahoo.com.au) from Sydney, Australia

This was the first version of Les Miserables that I saw. I have seen 3 versions since, including the excellent French version with Gerard Depardieu and John Malkovich, but none has the same sheer storytelling power of the 1952 version. Michael Rennie and Robert Newton are superb in their contrasting roles, and the support cast is excellent.

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3 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
involving drama, rather good, and true to the novel, 14 October 2008
7/10
Author: didi-5 from United Kingdom

With Michael Rennie as Valjean and Robert Newton - in a subdued and tense performance - as Javert, this version of Victor Hugo's great novel is involving, intelligent, touching, and passionate.

In comparison to the 1935 version with March and Laughton, this film stands up well, and looks good, with a literate script. Some characters from the novel are omitted for time constraints, but their absence is not missed.

A good and sturdy version then, not without flaws but carried forward by strong performances, particularly that of Newton, who fits the part of Javert extremely well.

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6 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
The best version of Les Miserables made, 11 August 2001
Author: kthurston from nashville tn

This is the best version of Les Miserables that has been made to date. I have seen all but the french version and this surpasses them. Michael Rennie is EXCELLENT as Jean Valjean. Its even better than the play.

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7 out of 12 people found the following comment useful :-
The worst version rather in respect of Victor Hugo, 14 February 2006
Author: jcbernardo from Paris, France

In reaction to the reviewer qualifying this the best version he has seen I feel obliged to point that Victor Hugo is not respected here ; Cosette had a peaceful childhood and appears with Hollywood pretty dresses, and Gavroche,the kid from the miserables (people in misery starving) which becomes an emblem dying during the revolutionary barricades against the oppressive crush from fortunate class and bourgeoisie, is reduced here to deliver a letter ! Try reach the director Raymond Bernard trilogy, with Harry Baur as Jean Valjean. You will discover reality, not "let's not hurt audience" casting or look. Another more faithful version is the one with Jean Gabin, but with so clean miserables ! No, the trilogy by Raymond Bernard, shown from decades on French TV, recently restored by Cinematheque Francaise, seems to be the Victor Hugo book alive. No concession, misery is there, corrupted houses, characters alive rather than actors on parade. This trilogy is beyond art, it is life, as Victor Hugo described it.

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4 out of 7 people found the following comment useful :-
LES MISERABLES (Lewis Milestone, 1952) ***, 28 May 2007
7/10
Author: MARIO GAUCI (marrod@melita.com) from Naxxar, Malta

Watchable version of the oft-filmed Victor Hugo tale: made by the same studio (Fox), it emerges as a wholly inferior remake of the superb 1935 version – which I reviewed earlier this month. Despite Milestone’s involvement, this one displays more surface gloss than genuine style – with the script itself being much more prosaic. Still, there’s an intermittent evidence of talent throughout – for instance, in the rather effective final shot which frames the mirror image of the protagonists between the all-important candlesticks; also worth noting is the score by Alex North which, particularly at the climax, feels like a dry run for his Oscar-nominated work on SPARTACUS (1960).

Michael Rennie and Robert Newton are fine actors, but their performances here are no match for Fredric March and Charles Laughton in the earlier film; though Newton is remarkably restrained, his role has been somewhat diminished to accommodate the sappy romance involving Debra Paget and Cameron Mitchell! Besides, it’s compromised by the loss of two small but important scenes from the 1935 version which, in this case, robs the character of essential depth: a) when Javert is humiliated by his peers for his lowly background, and b) when he blackmails newly-appointed Mayor Jean Valjean, a former convict, in his office; unbelievably, it substitutes the first by having Javert’s own father serve a prison sentence on the galley to which he’s himself assigned!

Other conceptual flaws include: Edmund Gwenn’s pivotal role of the Bishop, which comes off as whimsical alongside Cedric Hardwicke’s haunting turn in the earlier film; Valjean is depicted as an illiterate who receives schooling from the intellectual played by Joseph Wiseman (his Method approach feels out of place in a 19th century French setting!); Javert’s conscience-stricken demise here is, disconcertingly, brought about by his brief conversation with James Robertson Justice (as Valjean’s right-hand man); missing from the narrative, though, is the poignant character of Eponine (whose role gave a plausible melancholia to the romantic angle in the 1935 film).

Ultimately, I wouldn’t call the 1952 LES MISERABLES unnecessary, considering that it’s made with undeniable professionalism and the fact that countless other film versions have followed it; perhaps, the late eminent critic Leslie Halliwell summed it best in his claim that it’s “lacking the spark of inspiration”.

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Disappointing, 18 December 2008
Author: Andrea Snyder from United States

As a movie standing on its own I'd say its watchable but beyond that I am not able to muster any positive feelings.

As a great fan of the book (and the musical that came years after this movie version) I am horrified by the major changes that were made to the story. To completely cut out the characters of Eponine and Enjorlas, and a little less so, the Thenardiers alone is something horrible.

Also, it seemed to focus more on Marius and Cosette's relationship than Valjean.

Overall, I would not recommend it to anyone who is a fan of the book or the Les Miserables fandom in general. If you really want to watch a movie version I would suggest the 1934 one.

However if you have no previous experience with Les Mis then you may enjoy it more than I did.

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1 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
Thenardier,where have you been?, 12 March 2008
Author: dbdumonteil

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Lewis Milestone 's main merit here was to make a 105 min film out of a mammoth novel.This is the shortest version I know,and ,being French,I have seen plenty of them.This is the only version which does not feature the Thenardier family,which is a bit infuriating (like filming "David Copperfield" without the Murdstone brother and sister).For instance,the most famous scene in the whole novel,this scene every French pupil has studied once in his life where Cosette is given a doll by Valjean.

Apart from being "shortened" the plot has undergone some changes :Fantine meets Cosette for instance ,and of course Valjean survives (like in the more recent version featuring Liam Neeson).Gavroche is given very little time and the scene of his death,another strong moment of the novel is not on the screen:but as Gavroche is Thenadier's son,it makes sense.

Nevertheless,the story is well told and it is a wonder,considering the "adaptation" ,that the plot retains a certain coherence,focusing on the Valjean/Javert chase.Generally the actors shine in this part and Robert Newton is no exception.He gives the best performance in the movie.Debra Paget is the prettiest Cosette I know.Good support come s from Robertson Justice as Robert and Edmund Gwenn as Mgr Myriel the bishop(Courbet (?) in the movie).Sylvia Sidney ,an actress extraordinaire in Lang's movies,does not find one of her best parts with Fantine though.

This is not a version I would recommend to someone who has read the book however.

Like this?try these....

French versions Raymond Bernard 1933: the best version and the best Valjean (Baur) Jean Paul Le Chanois 1958 :starring Jean Gabin as Valjean but ,like in Milestone's film,Bernard Blier's Javert steals the show.

Robert Hossein 1982:Although praised by the critics at time of release (and spawning a musical which was played on every stage of the world),it's not an improvement on the 1933 version

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1 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
A Very Miserable Experience, 13 May 2007
2/10
Author: Lauren (sailortrinity08) from Virginia, United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

As a huge fan of the book and the musical, I have made it one of my priorities to see all of the movie versions of Les Miserables that I can. I can officially say now that this version is probably the furthest from the book, except perhaps the 1998 version. I cannot blame the actors, but I do blame the screenwriter and director for this slaughter of a classic.

The movie was okay up until the judge sentenced Valjean to ten years in the galleys. Valjean doesn't go to the galleys, he goes to TOULON, a PRISON CAMP where he does HARD LABOR. I could forgive this however, except that the movie only went downhill from there. The incident with the bishop is fairly similar...save that the dialogue seems to have been taken almost word for word from the 1935 version and that Mme. Magloire appears about twenty. Valjean is somehow able to buy a pottery plant after his "brilliant" idea to have everyone work on what they are best at. So much for glass beads. At this point he meets the entirely nonexistent Robert, who becomes a close friend that lives with Valjean for the rest of the movie. Why did they decide to make up characters, WHY? It was wholly unnecessary! Well...it would have been if they had stuck to the book. The way this script was going it was probably necessary.

Fantine, of course, does not sell her hair. Or her teeth. Because apparently audiences of the 1950s do not want to hear about such things. In fact, she looks quite good for a woman living on the streets. Fantine is not a prostitute either, because it's bad to promote prostitution as a way to survive when you cannot support your starving child any other way. And, because everyone has to believe that good things happen to dying people, Valjean goes and fetches a not-so-young-looking Cosette, who is reunited with her not-so-sick-looking mother. Bear in mind that this sequence is not shown, eliminating the Thenardiers entirely, as well as images of a malnourished Cosette. Apparently everyone is well aware Fantine is going to die, yet they go about their day ever-so-happily.

They end up at "The Convent of the Child Mary" because Petit Picpus is too hard to say. The sequence of meeting Marius in the convent is rather random, as is Marius' later accusation of Valjean being in love with Cosette. This IS NOT TRUE. Why? Why do so many directors and screenwriters think he's in love with Cosette? It's not TRUE. Anyway, Marius, not seeming overwhelmingly disheartened when Valjean won't let him marry Cosette (and also says they're leaving for England), ends up at the barricades. It's not really ever explained why there's a barricade in the first place. There just is. It's just a bunch of random people (and by that I mean, about five times as many in the book. It's 40, not 200) So Valjean intercepts Marius' letter to Cosette...which says something to the effect of "Your father is a jealous, horrible person. If I live, you should run away and elope with me." Totally opposite, of course, from the "I'm going to die, and I love you" letter that should be sent. Valjean seems to go to the barricade more to convince himself he's unselfish than to save Marius.

Then comes the sewer chase. The sewer chase upset me for one reason, and one alone. There was a skull on the sewer ledge. Just a skull. Not even a skeleton. Because so many people go down into the sewers and some how decapitate themselves such that their head remains on the ledge and their body floats away. It was so CORNY! I laughed very hard when I saw that skull. It also appears to be a flashback to the 1935 movie, where there was one present in those sewers as well.

Thanks to bad character development and a bad script in general, Javert's suicide seems entirely uncalled for. And Valjean watches. And the movie ends. And I start to cry and laugh simultaneously.

I am very upset at the plot changes, as well as the cuttings of Enjolras, Eponine, and the Thenardiers. I am upset that Valjean was a brute with few redeeming qualities throughout the movie, and that they did not show his confession to Marius nor his death. I am upset at the horrid characterization of Javert, who was among other things short, rotund, and non-menacing. I am upset that Fantine looked perfectly fine and got to see a thirteen-year-old Cosette again. I am upset that Marius was an unattractive, 35-year-old man without a background story to help you understand his character. I am upset at the addition of "Robert" into the story. I am upset that absolutely no one in a movie about the poor and miserable was poor and miserable except the galley slaves. In fact, Gavroche may have been the only character whose original attitude and appearance remained the same, though many of his scenes were cut entirely and he served more as a messanger than anything.

Some other unexpected defects in this wretched movie were the costumes. The costumes did not look at all like the clothes of 19th century Parisians, except for the National Guard uniforms. The hats, in particular, were very wrong for the time. It was saddening that no one did any research on this kind of thing.

The trailer advertised it as "A movie as great as the book!" The people who created this trailer must have never read it.

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1 out of 7 people found the following comment useful :-
A very good but not GREAT version with the exception of the great Robert Newton as Javert., 28 August 2001
Author: countryway_48864 from United States

The REAL reason to see this film is to watch Robert Newton as Javert. Javert was a gypsy born in prison who, by shear force of will on his part, has gotten himself into a position of power. He is inflexible and Spartan in his life style and expects as much or more of himself than he does his acquaintances, (he has no friends), and those he rules over.

The problem with the film is that Michael Rene is nothing like Hugo's massive peasant, Valjean. Jean Valjean was a stocky, broad-shouldered, barrel-chested man of only average height and a low center of gravity, Not the tall, slender, elegant Rene. AND, Rene was only an average actor. Deborah Paget couldn't act at all, she was there for pure decoration value.

See this film for Newton's Javert. He is superb.

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