The true P.T. Barnum was much more terrible man than that of the Barnum Hugh Jackman shows the audience. The real Barnum began his career by buying an African-American woman by the name of Joice Heth in time when slavery was illegal in the North. He went into debt in order to go through a loophole and buy another human being. At the time, Joice was being paraded around as the 161 year-old nurse of George Washington and Barnum had hoped to make a profit off of her. He took her on a tour and had her on display for around 12 hours a day. When she died, he held a live autopsy and had people pay 50 cents to watch. He spent the rest of his career making money off of hoaxes and lies and exploiting people with difference for a profit.
The movie version of Barnum is seen giving his performers a home and family when all he did was make money off of them. He is also shown giving everyone an equal voice. one notable line from the movie comes from the character W.D. Wheeler when talking about his and Anne's act. He says something along the lines of "people won't like you putting us on stage" referencing the time period and the discrimination of people with a different skin color. Barnum replies with a line like " I'll make them like you". Wow. he's such a great guy...
The amount of whitewashing in the film also covers up just how discriminatory the real Barnum was. His tall "man" was not a white man, but rather an African-American woman by the stage name of Madame Abomah. He also exploited a set of African-American twins named Millie and Christine who were conjoined, as well as albino brothers Eko and Iko who were "wild men". All four of them were either kidnapped or sold as children. While it is not apparent why this white washing took place, according to NBC News, it was not done out of ignorance. An excerpt from the article reads:
The filmmakers were clearly acquainted with Heth, Iko, Eko and their other contemporaries and their roles in the real-life Barnum’s success, because some are background performers in the film, bearing silent witness. I immediately recognized a dreadlocked character as Iko or Eko, the representation of Siamese twins Chang and Eng, as well as Barnum’s interpretation of a “Circassian beauty” with pale skin and a wealth of white ringlets. So ignorance does not explain this whitewashing of Barnum’s true character.
Barnum was made out to be a lovable con who makes mistakes but is always forgiven, when in reality he is the opposite. Any child who goes and see that movie without knowing the actual story is being lied to.
On the technical side of things, the movie had it's ups and downs. For a heartstring-pulling story, there was very little emotion and what was there was covered up by a song or a funny line, giving little time for the audience to feel. I sat there for half the movie, wondering what I was doing watching it because I felt nothing. The music had a good message and all, but was horribly auto tuned and lacked the gruffness of voice that makes one feel. I have to give it points though because the composers Justin Paul and Benj Pasek also composed my favorite musical Dear Evan Hansen. The cinematography was well executed I have to say with some very interesting shots and angles.
My rating overall is 1.5/10.
I'm so glad I found a cheap $5 ticket at a smaller movie theater because it's not worth the $12 at AMC.
