If you’ve been avoiding watching Les Misérables, the chances are, it’s for the same reasons as The Viewer.

• you hate Russell Crowe and would really prefer not to see him singing while dressed like Britney Spears;

• The Princess Diaries is one of the reasons you lost faith in humanity and you’re damned if you’re going to sit through another Anne Hathaway movie and risk it happening again;

• you live in a basement and there’s no chance your carer would unshackle you for the best part of three hours so you can maraud through an unsuspecting cinema audience and get arrested again.

Or perhaps not. Not everyone is lucky enough to have a carer. But suspend your disbelief and cynicism and see it anyway. You’ll learn some amazing, if not unbelievable, things.

• Anne Hathaway is mesmeric throughout and her performance of ‘I Dreamed A Dream‘ is enough to make an active sociopath howl.

• Hugh Jackman can act.

• Sacha Baron Cohen is capable of turning in a comedy performance that doesn’t make you want to eat your own face.

Or indeed, someone else’s.