By 1823, having fled Javert’s obsessive pursuit, he earns wealth and standing under an assumed name as a factory owner and mayor. His worldview is changed by the intervention of a kindly bishop (Colm Wilkinson), but his luck remains rotten. Based on Victor Hugo’s 1,400-page novel, the musical follows Valjean from his 1815 prison parole after he served 19 years for stealing a loaf of bread and for several attempts at escape. This impressive opening scene of the movie Les Misérables kindles the hope that Tom Hooper, who won an Oscar for directing The King’s Speech, will find reserves of ingenuity to bring one of the world’s most popular stage musicals to potent life onscreen. Finally it swoops into a closeup of one of the prisoners, the emaciated Jean Valjean (Hugh Jackman), exerting himself in the chorus of the condemned: “Look down, look down/ Upon your fellow man!” Ordered by the warden Javert ( Russell Crowe) to lift a heavy spar that carries another flag, Valjean does so, demonstrating tremendous strength and, in a brief tableau, proving he is a human Jesus, selflessly bearing a cross for the sins of humanity he has suffered all his life - and will suffer until his death.

Then it surfaces and ascends high above a ship being dragged into its dock by hundreds of rope-pulling convicts. The movie’s first shot begins underwater, beneath a tattered French flag.

Les miserables full movie youtube