{"id":6785,"date":"2013-01-18T06:37:03","date_gmt":"2013-01-18T11:37:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/?p=6785"},"modified":"2013-01-18T06:37:03","modified_gmt":"2013-01-18T11:37:03","slug":"7-les-mis-takes-11813","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2013\/01\/7-les-mis-takes-11813.html","title":{"rendered":"7 Les Mis Takes (1\/18\/13)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

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<\/a>\u2014 1 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

With my Javert medley of posts<\/a> and the\u00a0First Things<\/em> essay on justice of yesterday<\/a>, I may have exhausted (for the next few days at least) my\u00a0Les Mis<\/em> blogging, but, luckily, I\u2019ve got the whole internet to draw on for this week\u2019s\u00a0Les Mis<\/em> clipshow.<\/p>\n

And I have to start with the\u00a0Les Fiscal Miserables<\/a><\/em> tumblr<\/a>, which greatly lightened my heart during the fiscal cliff negotiations. \u00a0I am totally picking two of my favorites to embed:<\/p>\n

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Friend of the blog Yvain has written two meditations on\u00a0Les Mis<\/em>, justice, and goodness. \u00a0In the first, he uses Valjean as a lens on what it means for good to be a positive force, instead of the absence of evil<\/a>, and, in the second, he defends Valjean\u2019s choice to spare Javert<\/a> against a commenter raising utilitarian questions.<\/p>\n

<\/a>\u2014 3 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

But there\u2019s not just moral and political commentary! \u00a0There\u2019s also math! \u00a0Via flowing data<\/a>, Jeff Clark did a whole bunch of infographics based on the text of the novel<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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I may have complained (a lot) about Crowe\u2019s Javert, but I was interested by his take on how to make constant singing feel natural in a movie<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Once he\u2019d made the decision, then came the really hard part: directing a whole team of (very willing) actors who aren\u2019t talking, but singing. Surprisingly, he says, the singing part wasn\u2019t necessarily the problem: \u201cIt felt more novel to be doing a film with soliloquies because it isn\u2019t a form that is allowed in the modern movie, you don\u2019t have characters who talk by themselves for three minutes.<\/p>\n

\u201cRussell [Crowe who plays Javert] said something early on which was that you could see many of them as prayers. One of the solutions to the soliloquising was to think of it in relationship to people praying out loud or in their head.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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I\u2019m delighted by the way\u00a0Les Mis<\/em> figures into this priest\u2019s vocation story<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Monseigneur Bienvenu never knew! The heroism of Valjean\u2019s subsequent life was unknown to the bishop. Fantine, Cosette, Marius, Eponine, the Th\u00e9nardiers, Gavroche, Javert, the barricades, the students, the wedding\u2014all unknown. The bishop sent Valjean off with his silver and a promise, never to see or hear from him again. For all he knew, Valjean went back to his old ways. And yet it did not seem to matter. He treated Valjean as he treated everyone: as Christ would. Bienvenu was the unknowing mover of all that was to follow. But for his act of mercy toward Valjean, the whole beautiful story would not have been.<\/p>\n

This was when it hit me. I thought of the bishop, and the impact he made and what his priesthood meant. I can remember praying, \u201cLord, if that\u2019s what it\u2019s about, if my life can do that\u2026 sign me up.\u201d And the rest, as they say, is history.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/a>\u2014 6 \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

And speaking of the Valjean turned Bishop, Colm Wilkinson, here he is singing \u201cBring Him Home\u201d with three other Valjeans:<\/p>\n