The Pointer UW-Stevens Point Student Newspaper
Chase your dreams and never stop running towards them.
“The Greatest Showman” reminds viewers of everything they love about show business and what it means to live and to dream.
The film tells the story of Phineas Taylor Barnum as his life culminates to create the greatest show on earth, the Barnum Circus.
With stars such as Hugh Jackman and Zac Efron, the cast presents faces the audience will recognize while filling out with lesser-known but beautifully talented and diverse actors and actresses.
The story fits perfectly as a musical. Its striking and emotional numbers are paired with poignant choreography that will sweep the audience into Barnum’s world of the show.
Each song brings a new wave of emotion, carrying the viewer through a journey from wonder to heartbreak to hope to pride.
“The Greatest Showman” is not so much a “movie” as it is an experience. Before the film begins, a clip plays of director Michael Gracey and Hugh Jackman thanking the audience for coming to see the film and explaining that a theater showing is how “The Greatest Showman” is meant to be seen, amid an audience and as a live experience.
The film bridges the two worlds of the show and of reality in pure cohesion. The audience is allowed to be swept away into the wonder of a new world but, through the realness of the story, cannot forget the world from which they come.
In all ways, “The Greatest Showman” breaks down expectations. It changes how audiences think of their theater experience. It challenges the prejudices that exist in the world, including intolerance of difference, racism, socio-economic divide and the opposition that faces those who dare to dream.
Regardless of who he was before he entered the show, no one will leave the theater after seeing “The Greatest Showman” for the first time without being changed.
When you leave, your heart will be fuller, and maybe your eyes a bit damper, but you’ll carry with you something you’ll never quite forget. You’ll remember to celebrate who you are and how others are different from you.
And you will never forget to dream with your eyes wide open.
Kathryn Wisniewski
Co-Editor-in-Chief
kwisn877@uwsp.edu
