Chicago (2002)
★★½ — Chicago (2002)
Chicago (2002) arrives with considerable pedigree, rooted in a stage musical that itself drew from real events. The show, with music by John Kander and lyrics by Fred Ebb, first opened on Broadway in 1975 before a hugely successful revival in 1996 made it one of the longest-running productions in Broadway history. The film adaptation had spent years in development hell before Rob Marshall, making his theatrical feature debut after a career in television and stage directing, took the reins for Miramax and its production partners. The result was one of the most talked-about releases of its awards season, widely credited with reviving mainstream appetite for big-screen Hollywood musicals at a time when the genre had largely retreated from multiplex screens.
Marshall's central creative choice was to stage every musical number as a fantasy playing out inside the imagination of Roxie Hart, a young woman who shoots her lover and lands on death row in 1920s Chicago, where she finds herself competing for public attention with the already-notorious Velma Kelly. That framing device, rooted in vaudeville aesthetics and the smoke-and-mirrors theatricality of the era, gave the film its visual identity: all footlights, feathers, and choreographed spectacle. It is the kind of production that wears its ambition openly, and fans of his later work, such as his direction of Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, will recognise a similar instinct for large-scale, visually driven filmmaking.
The cast assembled here is hard to argue with on paper. Catherine Zeta-Jones takes on Velma Kelly, bringing a cool, assured physicality that suits the role to a tee. Renée Zellweger, perhaps a less obvious choice for a song-and-dance lead, plays Roxie with a wide-eyed opportunism that sits at the core of the film's satirical intent (and if you want to see her in a very different kind of production from around the same period, there is always the animated Shark Tale). Richard Gere takes on the role of slick defence lawyer Billy Flynn, leaning comfortably into the character's showmanship, while Queen Latifah provides considerable presence as the prison warden Mama Morton. The crime genre backdrop, filtered through satire and song, sets Chicago apart from something like Little Caesar, which treats its criminal world with a much more earnest, unflinching eye.
Chicago (2002) is slick, stylish, and sung-through with the kind of polished energy that screams “Oscar bait” and technically, it’s well-made. The choreography is sharp, the costumes glitzy, and the concept of blending fantasy and reality in a 1920s murder-and-celebrity circus is clever on paper. Renée Zellweger, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Richard Gere all commit fully, with Zeta-Jones especially stealing her scenes with icy charisma and killer timing. But here’s the thing: after the first big musical number, the film settles into a groove, and never really leaves it. Every sequence follows the same formula: real world cuts to vaudeville fantasy, song and dance, cut back, repeat. It’s visually consistent, sure, but the repetition makes it feel stale long before the end. The satire about fame, media, and justice gets drowned out by the razzle-dazzle, and the characters never grow beyond their archetypes. It’s not a bad film by any means, just one that didn’t connect with me. If you love Broadway-style musicals and don’t mind the rhythm being predictable, you’ll likely enjoy it more. But for me, it was all style, diminishing returns, and very little emotional punch. Competent, flashy, and fine as a night’s entertainment, but forgettable once the curtain falls. Not my cup of tea, but I can see why others raise a toast.
And that sums it up well, really. There is craft here that deserves acknowledgement, and I would not try to talk anyone out of enjoying it if the spectacle is what they are after. But craft and connection are not the same thing, and for me this one stays firmly in the "admire from a distance" category. The kind of film you can respect without particularly wanting to revisit. All that glitters, and all that.
Rating: ★★½ | Year: 2002 | Watched: 2025-09-13
Trailer
▶ Watch the official trailer for Chicago (2002) on YouTube
Where to watch
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Related on Movies With Macca
More from Rob Marshall: Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011)
More with Renée Zellweger: Shark Tale (2004)
More from the 2000s: Kirikou and the Wild Beasts (2005) · Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004) · Daredevil (2003) · Apocalypto (2006)
More comedy: The Eagle (1925) · The General (1926) · Americana (2023) · The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! (1988)
More crime: A Better Tomorrow (1986) · Angst (1983) · Stolen Face (1952) · Cairo Station (1958)
