The movie Morgan Freeman calls “a feast for the eyes and ears”
Throughout his long and distinguished career, Morgan Freeman has taken part in almost every genre cinema has to offer, but there has admittedly been one glaring exception on the big screen.
Notching up recognition and acclaim for lending his gravitas to dramas, comedies, comic book adaptations, thrillers, blockbuster action movies and more, Freeman has pretty much seen and done everything there is to see and do in Hollywood except a song-and-dance extravaganza.
He does have experience loosening up his pipes, having been a member of the Opera Ring musical theatre group in the 1960s, making his stage debut as part of the Hello, Dolly! cast in 1964, and of course, belting out his own bespoke theme song ‘Vincent the Vegetable Vampire’ during his time on the educational children’s series The Electric Company between 1971 and 1977, but any calls to join a cinematic musical have gone unanswered.
That doesn’t mean he can’t enjoy the medium as a viewer, though, with one of the most popular in the modern era becoming one of his favourite films. When speaking to Rotten Tomatoes, the Academy Award winner was celebratory in his assessment of Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge.
“It is probably one of the best overall conceived and executed films,” he said. “It’s got the best everything. Cinematography, acting, singing, dancing. It’s just all there, really a feast for the eyes and the ears”. Freeman, being a huge fan of the jukebox romance, comes slightly out of left field, considering it’s not the style of cinema people would even remotely connect him with, but Luhrmann’s epic clearly made a mark.
Landing eight Academy Award nominations, including ‘Best Picture’, Moulin Rouge would deservedly win two trophies for ‘Best Art Direction’ and ‘Best Costume Design’, and proved so popular that it would launch a stage adaptation in 2018, even if it remains unconfirmed as to whether or not Freeman has made the trip to see it in that particular format.
Freeman’s unabashed Moulin Rogue fandom has also seen him call the film “fabulous”, although he did acknowledge its relatively divisive nature. “Some people really like it and some people just don’t,” he reasoned. “I think when you have divided opinions like that, that’s the sign of art. It’s a work of art.”
There are no prizes for guessing which side of the fence he falls on, even if Luhrmann’s signature style of cinematic excess isn’t for everyone. Freeman also recorded an introduction to Moulin Rouge for the American Film Institute, where he once again anointed it as one of his all-time favourites and shared his hope that everybody watching it would enjoy it as much as he did. One thing that can’t be argued with is that his description of the film as “a feast for the eyes and ears” is completely correct.
