Les Miserables, Defending Russell Crowe

I probably shouldn't do this.

I'm here to put up a very small defense of Russell Crowe as Javert.

Why shouldn't I do this? Because my ear isn't refined. I've seen a single musical; I've performed in zero. And generally Russell Crowe isn't one of my favorite actors. People much smarter than I about music seem to hate his performance.

First, I wholeheartedly believe those who say he can't sing. I, even with my limited listening skills, recognize that he was the least skilled singer in the cast.

That being said, without Russel Crowe's part in "One More Day" in the preview I probably wouldn't have been excited to hear the movie--I still would have been excited to see the movie because I love the themes it works with, but musicals are somewhere near the bottom of entertainment events I want to see. And his voice continued to please me throughout the movie, especially when sung in concert with other characters. His solo I could have passed on but there was something I greatly appropriated about the way his voice weaved amongst the other character's.

This defense, again, requires that I openly admit to a lack of skill of mine: the ability to appreciate fine singing voices. With that stated twice, I'll now get to the crux of my appreciation. Most of the other voices sounded so similar to me. They feel like they're sung in a higher scale, that seemed unnatural for the singers to me, (and the women especially sounded all the same to me). They all lacked a certain amount of character to me. In contrast, Crowe's voice is distinct, not just in quality, but in timber. 

This distinction not only added to my enjoyment of the music but made sense in another way Javert is a unique character within the story (let us forget about the characters whose main purpose is comedic relief and storytelling foil). The other characters are all on the verge of becoming saints--they're at risk of being translated to heaven before they even have a chance to teach us of their great moral compasses--while Javert sits in stark contrast to all their perfections. And as his demeanor is different so too should be his voice.

In addition to this I think he did the best acting in the movie. So many others depended upon their voices and their closeups of anguished faces to move the audience. But Crowe runs a gamut of emotions with his face (at a reasonable distance) where his voice isn't up to the task. And although Javert is written as an archetype as much as any other character in the story, he feels the most human to me, which is to say he feels the most real, which I credit to Crowe's acting.

Now, let the beasts loose. Let them destroy my words. Let them scorn and scoff at my lack of refined tastes. Or, grant my weaknesses a mercy worthy of Jean Valjean.