This glossy adaptation of Jonathan Larson's Broadway hit is based on "La Boheme" by Puccini. While the film has a good message "Forget regrets or life is yours to lose" and strong lyrics "Without you" song etc, it is overall a film lacking in excitement. Part of the problem may be the director Chris Columbus. Columbus has never directed a film that I ever got excited over. Some of his earlier screenplays like "Gremlins" and "Young Sherlock Holmes" were pretty strong but Joe Dante and Barry Levinson directed those. "Rent" feels like his two Harry Potter fllms, well made, pleasant and watchable but offering little insight or excitement. It does not help that the cast is very forgettable and the film looks too sanitized and neat. Not at all looking like the sewer that lower Manhattan is. The film did bring back memories of my year in lower Manhattan attending NYU and living the life of a Boheme with other equally idealistic and pretentious friends. However, other than that this movie lacks maturity and sophistication. The love stories are filmed like music videos with little vive. It is an okay film I guess, nothing to stir the blood and nothing to really excite the senses. I am sure the Broadway show felt a lot edgier and vibrant. Basically this film is about a group of young people (men, women, gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, Black, White and Hispanic) struggling to pay rents at a particular run down apartment complex. The landlord's son in law is a sold out ex-Boheme and he is trying to stop a protest by a performance artist named Maureen. The colorful characters include a saintly gay, a fun transvestite, a tense lesbian, a drug addict exotic dancer named Mimi, a struggling musician who can't forget his dead lover and a principled film-maker who looks like he is from a Harry Potter movie. The cast sings, dances, fights for ideals and learn lessons about true love and compassion. Maybe they should of let someone like Alan Parker direct this. Chris Columbus shows no passion in this or any other film he has made.
Rated PG-13 for adult contents
Aspect Ratio: 2.35
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