Dear Evan Hansen (2021)

[Eric Prime]

Discuss

[Morieris]

I don't find his...appearance...to be the most distracting thing in the movie, more just how passive an observer he is. He's swept away in what happens. I get it. But he also has no personality besides "severely awkward and climbs trees"(?) IDK how it is on the stage, but we needed at least a more - not good, not bad, but interesting - protagonist.

[Webslinger]

A film that is sure to be a prime target of The Discourse between its casting, its unfortunate implication-laden plot, and its clumsy handling of extremely serious topics, Dear Evan Hansen is a mess. It's always abundantly clear that Stephen Chbosky's adaptation of the Tony-winning musical has good intentions and wants to say something meaningful about teenage mental health, but its tone is erratic and its plot requires both complete suspension of disbelief and the willingness to accept a whole lot of morally objectionable behavior from a protagonist the film frames as someone we're supposed to root for unquestionably. The central conceit - that a loner lies about being the best friend of a classmate who died by suicide because of a series of credulity-straining coincidences and misunderstandings - is problematic enough on its face, but it's made more problematic by the presence of upbeat, soul-searching ballads and a romantic subplot that - despite the film's best intentions to paper over it - feels an awful lot like the protagonist exploiting his lie to get closer to the deceased's sister. It's the kind of thing that could work in a pitch dark comedy - and did in the 2009 comedy World's Greatest Dad, where Robin Williams fabricates a suicide note and other related writings to spare the dignity of his jerkass son after his embarrassing accidental death. But whereas that film was acerbic and made no bones about Williams's character being an unscrupulous opportunist as soon as the story went viral, Dear Evan Hansen presents its title character and his situation as fodder for inspirational drama. It's going to be *far* too much for many viewers to swallow, and it mostly bungles its attempts to treat teen suicide, mental health, and social anxiety with the grace and sensitivity these topics deserve. It also doesn't help that the glossy musical numbers are out of step with Chbosky's more grounded approach to dialogue-driven scenes, which gives off the impression that this film wants to have its cake and eat it too with big crowd-pleasing music to balance out the lip service it pays to very serious issues. What saves Dear Evan Hansen from being a complete trainwreck, then, is its acting - okay, *some* of its acting. Much of the scorn heaped upon Ben Platt in the title role is his age, and while that's certainly a problem (he doesn't even look young enough to be a college student, much less a high schooler), the bigger problem is that he just never connects with his character outside of the musical numbers. As tonally discordant as the numbers are, they're at least the one place where I could squint and see what theatergoers loved so much about his Broadway performance; whenever he's just talking, however, he never looks comfortable in the role and lacks believable chemistry with any of his costars. Those costars, however, really do their best to salvage this mess. Kaitlyn Dever is also very visibly too old for her role (some of her outfits look like they're just begging for her to be holding a wine glass in her hand while wearing them), but she brings enough raw power to her role as the victim's sister to lend it more dimension than it has on the page. Amy Adams is also heartbreaking as the victim's mother, as she nimbly communicates her character's refusal to come to terms with her son's short and difficult life and her desire to have catharsis so badly that she's willing to believe the contrivances that set the plot in motion. There's also some really affecting work from Julianne Moore as the title character's mother and Amandla Stenberg as a classmate; Moore and Stenberg are both criminally underused, as they elevate every scene they're in. (That said, watching Dever's mannerisms definitely made me feel like Adams and Moore should have switched roles.) The problems with the film ultimately run too deep for any cast to save it, but the performers here at least soften the blow. I suppose there might be a good movie somewhere in Dear Evan Hansen - perhaps a darker one that really wants to wrestle with ideas it presents glibly enough that they play wrong here - but the product onscreen never rises above the baggage of its deeply uncomfortable plot.

 

C

[filmlover]

First thing's first: I never saw the Broadway musical. And after seeing this movie, I doubt I ever will. Now I can see why @Cap loves to drag this nonsense so much.

 

The biggest problem with the movie (and I'm going to assume with the play as well) is that it often feels like a peppy musical that ended up shoved inside a gravely serious character drama. Teen suicide and mental health are issues that are not at all meant to be taken lightly, and while the movie wants to come across as sincere, it often ends up rendering these topics trivial by filtering them through a glossy High School Musical-esque sheen. Paul and Pasek have certainly proven themselves as highly talented lyricists, but the musical numbers are always at odds with the serious tone of the rest of the material. It's been a while since I saw a movie that was so uncomfortable to sit through for reasons the filmmakers clearly didn't intend.

 

Too much has already been said about the much-derided decision to cast Ben Platt in the role he was already too old for when he originated it on Broadway and is now definitely too old to be playing in the movie (a move that may or may not have also been fueled by nepotism given that his super-producer dad was one of the people who funded this movie) that there isn't much else to talk about at this point. In his defense, he unquestionably has a great singing voice. Between his performances in other projects and now here though, his actual acting talent leaves a lot to be desired. He's never once able to make Evan a likable protagonist (a problem that's just as much on the script as it is his, admittedly), and he always looks out of place with the rest of his younger co-stars. This already has too many problems that not one actor could've sabotaged it on their own, but his presence becomes a constant distraction that the movie is never able to overcome.

 

There are good performances from the other notable actors (Kaitlyn Dever and Amandla Stenberg both continue to impress while Julianne Moore and Amy Adams bring gravitas to their minimally-written parts), but there's just too much wrong here on a fundamental level for them to elevate it. Congrats to another Broadway hit that has now moved on from the Tonys to the Razzies.

 

D+

Edited September 28, 2021 by filmlover