In reply to Hannah S: My sister and I bored our parents to death with the soundtrack of Les Mis when we were little and I know the score practically by heart (which is probably a bad thing as you spot all the bits they miss out in the film!). I've seen the film twice - the first time I thought it was good, but not amazing, the second time I loved it. I think the first time I was probably be too analytical and critical, whereas the second time I just relaxed and enjoyed it. My tuppence for what its worth...
If you don't like musicals, you probably won't like Les Mis, but to be honest if you hate musicals and you go and see it then it seems like a bit of a silly choice to me! I have to agree with the poster who said the first 45mins were the best - Hugh Jackman and Anne Hathaway give cracking performances and the physical changes in each character show their dedication to the roles. I also thought Eddie Redmayne was good as Marius and - after being prepared to hate him - lovel Sacha Baron Cohen. Russel Crowe did look a bit pained each time he had to sing and personally, I didn't think he did the songs justice, but otherwise he was a good Javert.
The main thing that got me was that every solo was filmed close up - in some cases this works, but not all the way through every song! Would have been good to have a bit of variety, but again just my opinion. The original scoring is played around with a bit, with some songs or sections of song missed out, reordered or cut short, but to be honest this doesn't detract at all and it's probably only pedantics like me who would notice...