Dear Evan Hansen movie review

 

Amongst the performers at last September’s West End Live event in Trafalgar Square were the cast of Dear Evan Hansen, led by (current Evan) Sam Tutty, who performed `You Will Be Found`. Apart from the emotion of the event marking the widespread re-opening of theatres, this song seemed to resonate on many levels, really holding your attention. I knew little about the musical but that song was so powerful I thought it’s parent show must be good. I couldn’t get to the cinema to see it but now its available to buy or stream so finally I have been able to find out all about it. Unfortunately I was to be disappointed…

I wanted to like it, really I did, but there are just too many things that don’t stack up. Not that it needs any more support. Penned by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (La La Land, The Greatest Showman)  from an original novel by Steven Levenson, Dear Evan Hansen has been a huge hit on both Broadway and in the West End in recent years so a big screen adaptation is no surprise. It’s titular character is a withdrawn High Schooler with mental health issues aplenty whose therapist has recommended he pen a positive letter to himself at the start of each day. After a day that goes particularly wrong Evan re-writes the latest letter in a less positive way. Only it falls into the hands of school bully Connor Murphy on whose body it is subsequently found when he commits suicide. So Connor’s family are led to believe that their son and Evan were friends, a notion that a befuddled Evan does nothing to dissuade them from. The fact that Connor 's signature is the only one on Even's seemingly everlasting plaster cast adds to the story.

The contents of the note and Evan’s increasingly elaborate lies about his supposed friendship draw Connor’s family closer to him and give him the attention he craves. More than that he becomes close to Connor’s sister Zoe for whom he has carried a flame for ages. Only Evan’s one friend Jared (“family friend” as he points out) is in on the deception, his techie skills used to concoct some emails to further enhance the tale. Actually this sequence has some of the bite and black humour the rest of the movie could do with. Evan’s heartfelt speech at a school memorial goes viral online and inspires others meaning he is now obliged to continue the whole thing. Not the expected plot for a musical you’d think and you’d be right. If there is such a thing as an Emo Musical then this is what it would be like-  rather grim, very unlikely and with songs that never break out of medium tempo. 

It is an interesting idea for a story though which challenges the viewer as to whether or not they want Evan to be found out- or is it better that his fiction creates so much goodwill that the truth doesn’t matter?  Certainly, the events bring Connor’s family closer together and creates enough positive vibes to fund a campaign to restore an orchard that the two supposed friends hung out in. However I’m not sure the narrative is sure footed enough. For one thing people don’t ask the obvious questions which they might in a situation like this as  no-one would ever have seen Evan and Connor together. Characters have handily been either too busy or pre-occupied to notice. The police don’t seem to investigate anything either, had they done so, Evan’s lie would almost certainly have been exposed. The fake emails and Even’s account paint a portrait of a sensitive boy more like himself than Connor. While you can give some leeway to the fact that teenagers keep secrets, nobody really questions the veracity of anything Evan tells them. I suppose this guileless lack of enquiry that allows Evan to take the story as far as he does could be read as a comment on our pre-occupied digital lives where we watch so much `content` created by other people yet fail to notice what is happening around us. 

Ben Platt originated the role on stage but by the time the film was made looked too old to be playing the character, not necessarily a problem in itself as many US shows cast twentysomething actors as teens. However to disguise this fact the actor has had some sort of prosthetic skin put on his face which, frankly, makes him look like an alien pretending to be human. It draws far more attention to the actor’s age than had he just carried on without it.

Platt is clearly a talented stage actor but in carrying those attributes onto the screen without dialling down he comes across as over acting. A succession of nervous tics and movements look too studied to be true and undermine our sympathy for a character who is already written as being somewhat whiny and over apologetic. By the end I found it hard to believe anyone like this could exist. His neuroses are so severe that his moments in the spotlight like making the speech at the memorial just don’t ring true. In other movies this would be a fantasy moment; here he really does it.

Which is a shame because the central message of the story is a good one as it speaks to the underdogs, the `anonymous` people who file through life without being noticed. I feel that had Evan been presented as slightly less insufferable and over indulged with problems the plot would work better. The show’s signature song `You Will Be Found` is a barnstormer, a call out to the lonely, the forgotten and the abandoned that is already being identified with a number of causes and situations. To give him his due, Ben Platt sings it from the heart but it’s the only time in the film the character seems authentic.

I’m surprised to find director Stephen Chbosky at the helm as he made one of my favourite films of the last decade The Perks of Being A Wallflower (slyly referenced in one scene). The themes of mental health issues and the difficulty of making friends are not dissimilar to Dear Evan Hansen but the subtle touch Chbosky brought to Perks is missing here though perhaps he doesn’t have material that is as strong to work with. I expect the story works far better on stage and it would help had this film been freed from the theatrical shackles it remains held by. There are moments when the story flares into life but from the dull colour palette to the crowd scenes or the songs, the staging is mostly uninspired. One song, `The Anonymous Ones`, cries out for an ensemble from the extras but instead all they get to do is walk around. A musical without a group dance number? What’s that even about?