I've been a fan of this musical for years and I've been a fan of Madonna's for years (although I've been pretty critical of her acting and choice of film roles), so I was ecstatic when she finally got the part she's been fighting for for many years. "Movie musicals are really long music videos with a storyline." I heard people refer to this film as that since it's release and, well yeah--it is, what the hell do you expect a movie musical to be like? If it was a film of the stage version, well, it wouldn't be a movie would it? This is a sung-through musical: no dialogue. Most other musical movies will have dialogue and then break into song, which seems unnatural and silly. Evita, from start to finish, is non-stop music, so there aren't really any awkward moments of breaking into song. I think this movie was extremely well-done, and well-sung (although other fans of the stage version criticized the way the music was re-written to accommodate Madonna's voice, but I found her voice to sound more natural than say, Patti LuPone's high-pitched shouting of every line being said/sung <I love Patti's Evita, but what worked for the stage, wouldn't work on film>). My only real gripes with the film are with the balcony scenes and the noticeable differences in the soundtrack where some parts were obviously sung live and not lip-synced--the audio just doesn't match up. The balcony scenes were either shot from so far that the cast looked like little ants in the background, or so close that you can't tell if it's really the real Casa Rosada's balcony (Madonna actually did sing on the same balcony Eva Peron made several speeches from) or just a set on a sound stage. Those two minor gripes aside, I really love this movie. And before you say, "but I don't like Madonna", well her acting is really pretty good here, but you'll find the real scene-stealer is Antonio Banderas. If you like musicals, you'll like "Evita".
Review of Evita
