Rant #Triggered

    

                               
                                                     The Greatest Showman *inserts facepalm*

    
Those who read my blog entries know that I am a very critical person when it comes to media like books and movies. I usually get past my cynical self by ranting to my mom, but after watching The Greatest Showman, I decided to inflict my opinion to my lovely readers, which is you. Thank you, whoever you are, for wasting about ten minutes of your life reading this; congratulations. But to be honest, at least you didn’t waste one hundred and five minutes watching a musical with plot holes bigger than Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. 

  I assume you guys know the drill. 
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/true-story-pt-barnum-greatest-humbug-them-all-180967634/:

(This is my source, in case you want to reference it. )

 * Disclaimer: The Greatest Showman Fangirls/boys will start a flame war in the comments section, so remember to cover yourself with a fire blanket and arm yourself with a fire extinguisher. On a minor note, spoiler alert. *

                                                           FlameWar Alert

 The Greatest Showman is supposed to be this historical musical about a pioneer into circus business, a dashing Hugh Jackman...who is supposed to be 60 years old. That’s right, PT. Sexy Barnum was actually an old coot when he began the business. You guys will have to bear with my condescending tone, I recently became a Hamilton fan, so I have crazily high standards when it comes to historical musicals. But also, it sucked. 

  Let me give you the actual overview on the figure of P.T. Barnum. P.T. Barnum, born Phineas Taylor Barnum, worked as a lottery store manager and a newspaper editor. He was one of those people who was always hungry for money and at age 25, he purchased the right to “rent” an elderly black woman who was named Joice Heth. He paraded her around as George Washington’s 161-year old nurse. Let me add that slavery was outlawed at that time in Pennsylvania and New York, but Barnum, being that goody smart person (yes, it is sarcasm) leased her for $1000 dollars through a loophole. 

  At that time, the Courier wrote scathingly, “Those who imagine they can contemplate with delight a breathing skeleton, subjected to the same sort of discipline that is sometimes exercised in a menagerie to induce the inferior animals to play unnatural pranks for the amusement of barren spectators, will find food to their taste by visiting Joice Heth.” 

  You think this is it? Oh, not by a long shot. When she died on February 1836, Barnum saw another move for dirty profit so he hosted a public spectacle. Can you guess what it is? Instead of given a proper burial, Joice Heth’s body was held as a spectacle in the New York Saloon, where a public autopsy was hosted. That’s right, he charged fifty cents for each person to see an old woman getting cut up in public. It was also revealed that Joice Heth was unsurprisingly half the age that was claimed for her. 

  But what is even the point about talking ethics? According to Hollywood, that word doesn’t even exist in the dictionary anyways. Sure, you could say that there was a flaw in their research, but I find that unlikely, seeing as how I discovered this detail on Wikipedia and reaffirmed by Smithsonian. Either Hollywood is very incompetent with history (which they are) or I should be the one running the movie. 

   Now, I’m going to affirm that I have nothing against the actors, rather, I watched the movie because I heard that both Zendaya and Hugh Jackman were going to be in it, and in my opinion, they did the best they could as always. What I do have a quarrel with is whoever wanted to bedazzle the story of a fraud and human rights abuser. 

  Think however you want, I’m not telling you what to think, but personally, I’m not sure if a person who cuts up an old woman and sends her dead body on display for money is exactly a person that should be seen as the common man who makes everyday mistakes.

  I was curious at first, why did people love this movie so much? I scanned YouTube comments to see why exactly people loved this, and most of them, like me, were ignorant to the atrocities conveniently omitted in the film. But they raised interesting points that the music was awesome and that they loved how the human “oddities” were brought together and became one huge family. 

  So what did I think about the music? I would say it was pretty much the worst musical I ever heard. Since I know there will be butthurt people demanding for my credentials and asking intelligent questions such as: “What the hell do you know about music? I bet you never even took a musical elective, loser—“ 

 I will respond with this. I took piano lessons when I was little and I took the band elective for six years. Also, I happen to be a musical enthusiast who is very picky. There was nothing extraordinary about the music. It was something you could hear everyday on the radio pop station. Also, those who have seen the musical will know that there was a soprano Jenny Lind who was known as the “Swedish Nightingale.” Those who watched it would know what I am going at. I assumed that if Hollywood was going to bring forth an opera singer, they would make her actually sing opera. Yeah, no—they decided that she would sing pop, because that’s clearly the same thing as opera.

 As a person who loves opera, I quite frankly, found it insulting that they couldn’t even respect classical music and show it in its true form. And don’t get me started about the pathetic pop hand motions she used; which are not even remotely used in actual opera. Opera is an art form just like pop, and they should be properly distinguished, and also to add that historical authenticity that the film should have delivered. Heck, I wasn’t even expecting much, I thought they would have the decency to at least make Jenny Lind sing popera, with a few cadenzas here and there, but apparently, I was asking for too much when I wanted an opera singer to sing opera. 

  Another point. The way they portrayed Queen Victoria. I’m going to leave it at this—the way Barnum and his trope acted towards her was highly unlikely and extremely rude and her character was watered down until it became a mockery. Let me just tell you this, Hollywood, Queen Victoria brought forth the whole Victorian Era, in which she emphasized her own strict ethics and personality into the country. I’m not sure for what reason you showed her like that, but if you even bothered to search up her biography, she is a person who went through so much emotional struggle in her life, and it is quite frankly, disgraceful for you to show her legacy the way you did. You also seemed to forget in the middle of writing her lines that she was the Queen of the United Kingdom Of Great Britain and Ireland, and she would never have acted like that. 

   At this point, I should be done with my historical ranting, but I’m not, but will move on to the flaws in the plot. 

Number one. There was virtually no plot and the transitions from script to song were awkward at best. 

Number two. As mentioned above, Hollywood neglected the actual history of Barnum. Looks like someone didn’t pass history class. 

Number three. The romance was sloppy, not to mention improbable between Zendaya and Zac Efron, who had virtually no chemistry together for people who fell in love at first sight. The film showed how prejudiced the rich upper class was to Barnum and his family even as they rose up, so, why the hell would Phillip (his character) even begin to respect and like a trapeze artist who is at the very bottom of the social ladder? 

Number Four. Jenny Lind kissing Barnum to put him into a scandal. Please don’t start with that, Jenny Lind was known as the Swedish Nightingale also because of her great sense of charity; she became very popular in America because of her charitable donations as well. Furthermore, she was seen as pure and by no means, was she that vixen that Hollywood portrayed in their film. Seriously. Someone needs to do actual research. 

Number Five. So some people liked the musical because Barnum made a family for his circus “freaks.” Don’t pretend for a second that Barnum actually cared about them; he cut up an old woman just to make money, you think he gives a single shit about them? To people like Barnum, others are measured by profit, and he used his “freaks” to make money off of them—think of it as a zoo but instead of animals, there are people. Brings a whole another perspective of the word, ‘Sugar coating’ doesn’t it?

Number Six. Thank you for reading this rant, seeing how long it is, I applaud those who made it all the way. 

Signing off, 

InkRights

                                             Ink