Title: Dear Evan Hansen
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Director: Stephen Chbosky
Starring: Ben Platt, Kaitlin Dever, Julianne Moore
Runtime: 2 hr 17 mins

What It Is: Evan Hansen (Platt) is an awkward kid. He has social anxiety to the extend he can’t even order Postmates. His therapist makes a suggestion that he write letters to himself. When he writes one of these letters at school and prints it this falls into the hands of Connor Murphy (Colton Ryan). Connor is not the friendly type. When Connor ends his life the letter is found in his pocket. A misunderstanding occurs and leads Evan down a road he never thought about.

What We Think: What even is this? We’re going to go ahead and resist talking about Ben Platt being cast. Nepotism. Aside from that this is just a really terribly written film. Let’s begin at well…the beginning. Evan starts as this super anxious kid. As the movie grows and we learn about him. His anxiety tends to dissipate…why? If he’s deathly afraid of contact then how can he suddenly get up in front of an entire group of people and belt out “You Will Be Found”. The movie phrases this as a speech but you get the point. The entire premise rest on us being sympathetic to Evan but why would anyone wanna do that? He literally lies to an entire family about their dead son. That’s not a spoiler it’s in the trailer. He continues the lie to an almost perverse degree. If you listened to the music in this isolated from the narrative it works better. One song, in particular, entitled “If I Could Tell Her” comes off as eerie and almost creepy. This is due mainly to the primary two issues the film has. Here goes. Ben Platt looked too old to play this role with the way they costumed and made him up. He looked like the Madame Tussauds version of the same man who originated the role on Broadway. There are smaller nuances to his performance that just: don’t work, are annoying, or overall hurt it. Chbosky has made a much better coming-of-age film in his adaptation of his novel The Perks of Being a Wallflower. This is just such a flat and uninteresting film adaptation of a Broadway play I never cared for to start.

Our Grade: D+, If the tunes were catchy and great on their own this would’ve been a cinematic failure. There’s no reason to watch this film when the soundtracks for both the film and play exist. Unlike tick, tick…BOOM whose original song “Swimming” works really well in its spot the original song here called “The Anonymous Ones” does not work and seems shoehorned in for no apparent reason. This film adaptation is pretty much only for superfans of the musical. The subject matter present in this play deserves better than this as a leading advocate for the importance of mental health. Here’s a song that works better when you don’t have to watch this terrible film.

If you or someone you know is in need of help don’t hesitate to call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255