"Stop waiting for permission for you to be you."
Everybody's Talking About Jamie is a feature film adaptation of the hit West-End musical about a teenager from Sheffield, England who wants to be a drag queen. Going in, I knew very little about the musical. Those who've seen it really liked it which brought some hype around it. And with its planned release last year, which ended up being moved for obvious reasons, had people speculating its chances at the Golden Globes in early predictions. Coming up to its release last week, it was so quiet. I barely saw any advertisements or anything surrounding the movie. Even I forgot about it until I saw it under the new release section last weekend. What could've been a good adaptation disappointed me into a fairly forgettable story. The way the movie plays out is basic. They move through the story quickly that there's not enough time to sit and enjoy. The inevitability of songs and scenes being cut makes sense for its considerably short runtime seeing as the stage performance is the standard 2.5 hours. Excluding the credits, it's just around 1:40:00. I would've liked to see more, but I'm sure there's some reasoning to why so much was cut. The main storyline is interesting and something many would like to see, but it's disappointing how bland the writing is. I rarely felt compelled, though I wanted the best for the characters.
If anything shines, it's the performances. Max Harwood is great as Jamie and is fully committed. And the other standout, and my favorite part of the movie, is Richard E. Grant. His character has the most development of them all. They replaced a song from the stage performance with a new one, and that was the highlight song for me. Most of the songs aren't all that interesting or memorable. There's not much tone in their voices, and maybe that comes with the style of music, but it didn't strike me as something great. And the numbers could've used some work. There are a couple that are styled almost like a music video and I did like those sequences. But it's not enough to remember them. Director Jonathan Butterell has interesting ideas that only work in pieces. Stage and screen are completely different and the quest to transfer to screen didn't quite make the mark. Besides a few sequences, it's pretty adequately directed. What left me feeling empty was the ending. Because there was a lack of buildup to it, once it ended I didn't realize it was the end exactly. The solution was simple and once solved it just ended. It's very anticlimactic. I wanted to like Everybody's Talking About Jamie more, but in the end it was just fine. I don't find myself revisiting it but I can say that I watched it. I know some people will really connect with it, and if you do, good for you.
Everybody's Talking About Jamie is a feature film adaptation of the hit West-End musical about a teenager from Sheffield, England who wants to be a drag queen. Going in, I knew very little about the musical. Those who've seen it really liked it which brought some hype around it. And with its planned release last year, which ended up being moved for obvious reasons, had people speculating its chances at the Golden Globes in early predictions. Coming up to its release last week, it was so quiet. I barely saw any advertisements or anything surrounding the movie. Even I forgot about it until I saw it under the new release section last weekend. What could've been a good adaptation disappointed me into a fairly forgettable story. The way the movie plays out is basic. They move through the story quickly that there's not enough time to sit and enjoy. The inevitability of songs and scenes being cut makes sense for its considerably short runtime seeing as the stage performance is the standard 2.5 hours. Excluding the credits, it's just around 1:40:00. I would've liked to see more, but I'm sure there's some reasoning to why so much was cut. The main storyline is interesting and something many would like to see, but it's disappointing how bland the writing is. I rarely felt compelled, though I wanted the best for the characters.
If anything shines, it's the performances. Max Harwood is great as Jamie and is fully committed. And the other standout, and my favorite part of the movie, is Richard E. Grant. His character has the most development of them all. They replaced a song from the stage performance with a new one, and that was the highlight song for me. Most of the songs aren't all that interesting or memorable. There's not much tone in their voices, and maybe that comes with the style of music, but it didn't strike me as something great. And the numbers could've used some work. There are a couple that are styled almost like a music video and I did like those sequences. But it's not enough to remember them. Director Jonathan Butterell has interesting ideas that only work in pieces. Stage and screen are completely different and the quest to transfer to screen didn't quite make the mark. Besides a few sequences, it's pretty adequately directed. What left me feeling empty was the ending. Because there was a lack of buildup to it, once it ended I didn't realize it was the end exactly. The solution was simple and once solved it just ended. It's very anticlimactic. I wanted to like Everybody's Talking About Jamie more, but in the end it was just fine. I don't find myself revisiting it but I can say that I watched it. I know some people will really connect with it, and if you do, good for you.