“Change is inevitable in life.” Everything around him changes over time. Each individual has the opportunity to bring a change in his life. Some people prefer to spend their lives doing the same things and avoid change. Others, on the other hand, are not afraid to try new things. They believe that change can be a good thing. Well, in the movie Les Miserables, you will meet a man who was jailed for nineteen years for stealing a piece of bread and then decided to change for the better and make things right again. This character is none other than Jean Valjean. This review will focus on it. A person who undergoes changes, from someone with confused morals to a man with more morals than most, who respectfully learns to love and share. The story took place in the country famous for its sophistication: France. It is in the 1800s while the French revolution occurs. As the story is told, see how this ex-con was transformed from a miserable criminal into a heroic, courageous and peaceful man.
The story began when convict Jean Valjean was released from a French prison after serving nineteen years for stealing a loaf of bread and subsequent prison break attempts. When Valjean arrives in the town of Digne, no one is willing to give him shelter because he is an ex-convict. Desperate, Valjean knocks on the door of Monsieur Myriel, the kind priest of Digne. Myriel treats Valjean kindly and Valjean repays the bishop by stealing his cutlery. When the police arrest Valjean, Myriel covers for him, claiming that the cutlery was a gift. The authorities release Valjean and Myriel makes him promise that he will become an honest man. Eager to keep his promise to him, Valjean disguises his identity and enters the city of Montreuil-sur-mer. Under the assumed name of Madeleine, Valjean invents an ingenious manufacturing process that brings prosperity to the town. He eventually becomes the mayor of the city. Without warning, he met a young woman named Fantine who has an illegitimate daughter named Cossette. He promised the girl that she would adopt her child and treat her as if she were his own. As time passed, Cossette and Jean Valjean found a new and peaceful life for a time in the convent, but the two eventually left the convent and lived in Paris again. Cossette falls in love with a young man named Marius. The political situation deteriorates in Paris and the city experiences a violent uprising. Marius joins the fight out of desperation. Jean Valjean joins the fight to take care of Marius, even though a part of him wants Marius out of Cossette’s life forever. Valjean saved Marius’s life, although Marius does not know who saves him. After Marius is cured, he returns to find Cossette to marry. After that, Marius found out that it was Valjean who saved him. The newlyweds rush to Valjean’s side just in time for a final reconciliation. Happy to be reunited with his adopted daughter, Valjean dies peacefully.
Symbolism is something that is woven deep into Les Miserables; it is kept in stolen silver candles that prompt recovery, and the yellow travel permit that indicates social foul play. As for the candles, they are not very recent. They symbolize a deeper importance. After Jean Valjean is released from jail, the special case that will take him in and treat him like a person is the Priest of Digne. Unfortunately, still making up for lost time in his old dying methods and submitting badly to survive, Valjean takes the silver the Priest used during dinner. The silver speaks of the bishop’s goal of approaching Valjean with deference; onward, when a policeman takes Valjean away with a large amount of silver in his backpack and returns it to the Priest, the Priest reacts by saying that he had given Valjean the silver as a blessing and instructs him to take the candles as well, advising him that they are worth around two hundred francs. He also advises Valjean to remember that he “guaranteed to use this money to become a legitimate man.” Not only that, the Priest speaks of recovery and redeeming quality when he says: Jean Valjean, my brother, you will never again have a place with insidious, but too great. It is your spirit that I buy from you; I remove it from dark contemplations and the soul of destruction, and offer it to God. As for the yellow ticket, when Jan Valjean finally gets out of the penitentiary, he was given that paper. At first, it seemed like a ticket to flexibility, but it definitely isn’t. It’s more like a ticket to much more misery. That’s because the Yellow Ticket is an image of social dismissal. Jean Valjean must communicate with him constantly to signal to people that he is an ex-con, or else she will be ignoring his parole and going back to jail. The thing is, this ticket gets people fired wherever he wants him to go. As Valjean tells the priest Myriel: “This is my leave ticket: yellow, as you can see. That’s why everyone fires me.”
Arguing largely unreasonable. Whatever he did was take a piece of bread to cheer up his hungry family, and as a result he was thrown behind bars for a long time. Now that he has taken his chance and is out, the so-called free world is, by all accounts, more pitiful than imprisonment, in light of the fact that he could rest and eat in prison in any case. . Because of that yellow ticket, Valjean sadly discovers “the importance of freedom when attached to a yellow ticket,” which is not freedom at all. The yellow ticket symbolizes the unpleasant way society treats its untouchables. He shows us that “opportunity” doesn’t mean trouble if what it implies is that you’re allowed to starve and bite the dust.
As someone who doesn’t like to watch musicals and plays, the movie Les Miserables has been a revelation to me that movies like these are a must. The flow of the story is very organized and well composed. The cinematography and effects were surprisingly good given that the movie was from 2012 and the way the characters played their parts is amazing. The dialogues were wonderfully delivered by the characters with the correct expression, emotion and feelings so that the viewers can also perceive the emotion and enthusiasm in each scene. Although some of the characters have limited exposure time, their role left a big impact on viewers. As for the character of Jean Valjean, he was excellently done. The actor is very fit for that role, it was a bit disappointing because in the end, Jean Valjean died. But overall, the movie was perfect. It gave viewers a clear view of how the French Revolution began and ended. In closing, I would like to congratulate the people behind this very good film. They all deserve a big round of applause.
