Why is it that some of us love musicals, while others can’t stand them? I guess it’s all a matter of how distracting you find singing to be while you’re trying to suspend your disbelief and focus on a story. While I really do understand where the musical haters are coming from on this, to me pairing a story with singing just makes it twice as effective in conveying what it’s trying to tell. Even if the story and characters are kind of shoddy, pairing them with some bops can turn a sub-par script into a classic (would we really like Grease that much if it weren’t for the music?) And while I seem to meet more anti-musical people than musical lovers, the genre has continued to prosper (or at least exist) on both on stage and film.

Speaking of things that won’t die, the story of Cyrano de Bergerac is getting yet another retelling–this time in film musical form! (And this isn’t even the first time Cyrano de Bergerac has been made into a musical.) This adaptation is starring Peter Dinklage as the title character. For those of you not as familiar with the story, Cyrano de Bergerac is a witty poet and officer of the French army who has one major problem: he feels too ugly to pursue Roxanne (in this film, played by Haley Bennett), the woman he’s secretly in love with. Roxanne, who is a notoriously picky young lady, believes she’s fallen in love at first sight with the handsome Christian (Kelvin Harrison Jr.), a new recruit in Cyrano’s unit. Unfortunately, Roxanne values a sharp intellect and a way with words above all else, which poor Christian lacks. Just wanting her to be happy, Cyrano composes love letters in Christian’s name–which ultimately makes things more complicated.

Originally, the issue lays with Cyrano possessing an abnormally large nose. In this version, the title character has a normal nose, but being played by Peter Dinklage, being short of stature is the source of his insecurity. I gotta say, it translates just as well, if not better. Dinklage once again proves himself to be one of the best actors of our time, especially in using facial expression to convey emotion. I can’t help but to compare Cyrano with his performance as Tyrion Lannister in Game of Thrones, however. I know (and have seen) Dinklage playing a vast range of characters that are nothing like Tyrion, but this performance was the  only one since Game of Thrones that reminded me of him. It’s definitely not a bad thing! I merely can’t help but to notice the similarities between the two characters now, and note that Dinklage has a definite type he’s really good at playing. Other than that, the rest of the cast were generally charming. Haley Bennett is a delightfully fiery Roxanne, definitely showing more er…enthusiasm we’ll call it than I’ve ever seen for the written word.

What makes a musical really sell, as mentioned earlier, is of course, the music. For the most part, the songs were good. Not show stoppingly, ear-wormy, gonna sing them in the shower later great, but definitely pleasant. Accordingly, the quality of the singing felt the same as the songs. I wouldn’t count anyone in the film as amazing singers, but they don’t hurt my ears either. There’s definitely a certain sincerity in the way the actors sang in this film. I could tell director Joe Wright was trying to give a raw Les Miserables sort of feel to the performances. Yet this film features something Les Mis definitely didn’t have: people breaking out into elaborate dance numbers throughout almost every song, rendering Cyrano not nearly as heavy of subject matter in comparison. Again, this is also not a complaint.

This may be a strange take, but Cyrano didn’t come across as the modern film musical it wanted to be. Instead, it made me reminisce about a very specific time period of movie musicals, somewhere between 1968-1980. This was a time in which musical set’s weren’t afraid to be darker and more gritty, the actors seemed to focus more on emoting rather than singing ability, and the editor loves to sneak in plenty of gorgeous scenery. Think Oliver, Willy Wonka, and Fiddler on the Roof, to get what I mean. Cyrano really felt like one of those, gorgeous scenery included.

Only time will tell if Cyrano will join the ranks of classic musical films. While I certainly don’t think it would be the one to win over any musical haters out there, I think it has plenty to offer musical lovers, as well as fans of the original play. If anything, I respect this version for putting a slightly different spin on the classic story, while still leaving the important plot points in tact. Maybe I’ll even learn a few songs from it after all, if just to sing in the shower…