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I really love musicals, but Netflix's attempt at a cheerful, joyful, colorful, and culturally significant film turns out to be one of the most cringe-worthy, awfully stereotypical, ridiculously exaggerated movies of the year. From the astoundingly over-the-top (and honestly, somewhat insulting) performance from James Corden and Jo Ellen Pellman's one-dimensional debut to the contradictory narrative, Ryan Murphy's first feature film since 2010's Eat, Pray, Love is a massive disappointment.
The Prom is supposed to celebrate equality by supporting an inclusive prom where everyone can go and feel comfortable being themselves. However, it restrains itself from showing a homosexual kiss or really any sort of intimacy, leaving that to the very last second of the movie, but it doesn't have any problems in fully developing a heterosexual relationship meanwhile. The breaking out into songs (which are a bit too many) mostly feels incredibly forced, making the whole film look more like a collection of sketches than an actual movie.
A few excellent performances (Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman, Andrew Rannells, Keegan-Michael Key), a couple of quite entertaining musical numbers, some nice choreography and camera work (Matthew Libatique), and an admittedly ambitious production design save this film from being a complete trainwreck, but it's still a disaster.
Rating: D+
