The Last Five Years

You may not be a hardcore musical theatre fan. It's rumored that such people exist. In which case, you may not be familiar with Jason Robert Brown, a composer and lyricist that some have compared to Sondheim (only in this case that comparison has some merit), and you may not have heard of the famous experimental musical "The Last Five Years."

The show is just two people, a couple who alternately sing songs, the Academy Award nominated Anna Kendrick ("Into the Woods," "Pitch Perfect" and a whole slew of independent films screened at the Sundance Film Festival) and Grammy Award nominee Jeremy Jordan (NBC's "Smash," and the Broadway version of "Newsies.")

Cathy Hiatt (Kendrick) is a struggling actress while Jamie Wellerstein (Jordan) is a wunderkind novelist who never needs to fight to be appreciated. They meet and fall in love, then five years later, they break up. But here's the thing - over the course of this five years, his story moves chronologically forward in time and hers moves backward. Cathy's story starts at the end of their relationship finishes at the beginning, and Jamie moves, in alternating scenes, from the first time they hook up to the end of their relationship. As you can imagine, they meet in the middle, and this happens when Jamie proposes.

Writer and director Richard LaGravenese crafts this series of songs into a complete story by filling out some dialogue and visually weaving the narrative together. Though LaGravenese has directed such films as "P.S. I Love You" and "Beautiful Creatures," he is best known for his screenwriting, mostly adaptations of other works. (A bit of trivia: LaGravenese wrote the screenplay for "The Bridges of Madison County," a novel that Brown adapted in to a Broadway musical.)

Not only does LaGravenese demonstrate the chronology by casting the early years in bright and vivid color while painting the ending years as grey and desaturated, but he also adds dance numbers with background characters and visual allusions which even people who don't know musical theatre will recognize.

With all its pictorial and musical charms the best part of this movie is still the ebullient talents of Kendrick and Jordan, because in the end this musical is about two characters selling one song after another.

The special features are slight. There's a 4-minute introduction by Jason Robert Brown and a "Sing-Along Subtitles" option (which is basically just the movie with subtitles on only the lyrics of the songs).

"The Last Five Years"
Blu-ray
Rated PG-13 / 94 min.
www.thelastfiveyearsmovie.com