What did I do for Thanksgiving? I started my morning by watching/thoroughly enjoying the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade while snacking on M&M’s as the Thanksgiving food cooked for lunchtime. When the National Dog Show began food was ready and oh was it delicious. Once my Thanksgiving food was finished I started getting ready to go to the movies to watch Disney’s 60th animated film, Encanto. And I had a fun time.
Encanto, like every Disney movie, is vibrant with an emotionally-driven story and a batch of likable songs. Unfortunately, this was not the film I expected.
Lin-Manuel Miranda has made his directorial debut with the newest Netflix Original Film, tick, tick…BOOM!, starring Andrew Garfield as iconic Broadway genius, Jonathan Larson, the man who created Rent. It’s a story about him, his friends, and how he eventually becomes the genius the world heralds him to be.
I was actually rather impressed with the film which sucked me in thanks to its surprisingly funny humorous moments as it well as its standout musical numbers that actually felt creative and, at times, mesmerizing.
My favorite musical numbers were “No More” and “Sunday” which easily stood out among the pack with Miranda’s brilliant direction. He really injected life into this movie when it could’ve easily could’ve bored me to tears.
Will Andrew Garfield get an Oscar nomination for his role as Jonathan Larson? Yes. Will he win? I definitely don’t think so. But he definitely surprised me with his shockingly good singing voice.
Is tick, tick…BOOM! an instant classic? No, it definitely isn’t. But it definitely is a good movie and the best new musical I’ve seen in a while.
I thank you for reading and I hope you have a great day.
Disney and Marvel Studios have certainly provided a Thursday surprise with trailers for both Encanto, a Disney movie with songs by Lin-Manuel Miranda, and the long-awaited trailer for What If…? which is actually quite exciting looking. Here’s the trailer for Encanto.
In just one minute and thirty seconds, this teaser trailer is everything I hoped and thought In The Heights was going to be. It’s vibrant, the music covers me in chills, the characters are so beautiful and unique, and it looks like another Disney win that I will definitely be seeing in theaters this fall.
When I first saw the trailer for In The Heights last year I watched 30 seconds and wasn’t interested. When I learned it was Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first major and critically-acclaimed Broadway play I was super excited to see this film adaptation of this movie. And so I did…and it did not make me happy.
As an avid musical fan, I know how great a musical can be. I’ve seen the likes of An American in Paris, The Sound of Music, and Singin’ In the Rain, and they were magnificent! But I also understand that musicals are some of the hardest films to make.
They’ve recently begun to surge back into the cinema with recent hits like The Greatest Showman and multi-Oscar winning La La Land and now this year we’re getting two musicals; In The Heights and West Side Story.
In The Heights, directed by John M. Chu (Crazy Rich Asians), is basically a latino version of Do The Right Thing. The story takes place in Washington Heights at the height of summer and it follows a few characters who are simply trying to make their dreams come true. It sounds like a decent plot for an inspiring musical but it was overshadowed by a weak remake of a Broadway play.
Like Hamilton, there is a lot of singing! I mean, a lot. But while the singing helped move the story along for the critically-acclaimed Broadway play about our country’s fore fathers in a movie that much singing just feels like a bunch of nonsensical noise. I wanted to get invested in the characters but the first hour lost my interest completely.
To try to seem like an epic musical there were bunch of unnecessarily huge musical numbers with a bunch of dancers that just felt out of place. When a couple of characters in love are singing about how they want to be together you don’t want to see twenty people dancing happily around them. It’s distracting.
None of the songs were memorable, the lyrics were boring, and there was nothing truly rewarding about this movie. The only part that made me smile and want to dance was a sequence when the characters went to a club. Now that part was fun. Oh, and a little moment with Miranda playing the part of a beloved popsicle man and his brief moment to shine. But besides that, I was annoyed by something I couldn’t get a chance to enjoy.
I wish I could say In the Heights is the best movie of the year so far but unfortunately, I can’t.
Now I’m just hoping Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story is more enjoyable.
I’ll give this movie 70 out of 100 and 2 out of 5 stars.
I thank you for reading and I hope you have a fantastic day.
Oh my gosh, I forgot just how much I love this musical. Before yesterday I had seen the Broadway work of art a total of four times in the span of about two weeks and then I decided to take a break…a break that finally ended last night and once again, I was lost.
This Broadway masterpiece is truly one of the greatest things I have ever seen. Its attention to detail is staggering, its lyrics tell a story that is both complex and mostly accurate, the actors are simply outstanding, specifically Leslie Odom Jr. who does such a tremendous job breathing life into Aaron Burr’s side of the story, and of course, by the end, I was crying again. (Five times in a row and I haven’t been able to contain my tears.)
I cannot fully express in words how moving and inspiring Hamilton is to someone like me. Lin-Manuel Miranda provided the world something that feels poignant, powerful, and feels like a glimpse at what movies, television shows, and Broadway shows will and should look like in the coming decades. The idea that people of color can’t hold a show, aren’t as talented as other actors, and aren’t smart enough to produce the type of mediocre content that dominates our entertainment is laughable and Hamilton proves that point.
I love it, love it, love it so much and I can’t wait to see more Broadway shows in the future.
I thank you for reading my gush post about Hamilton and I hope you have a lovely day.
Oh man, this is just the type of entertainment I was looking for. Fantasy is a near-impossible genre to pull off on the big or little screen because the worlds and characters can be so fantastical that it’s hard to translate or the stories can be dumbed down and turned into utter disasters.
Just look at films like Warcraft, Eragon, or The Chronicles of Narnia sequels (I happened to like the first one.) Each of these movies could’ve been great but they lacked heart, good storytelling, and great world building.
And then there’s those two great series like The Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter movies which are absolutely breathtaking in scale, storytelling, and casting. Even their sequels, The Hobbit/Fantastic Beasts, were disappointments.
After enjoying the heck out of Sherlock I’ve been looking for a new show to sink my teeth into and ran into His Dark Materials, a show on HBO that swept me away in two days. (I happened to watch the last five episodes of the first season yesterday alone!)
Now, I have to let you know, I’ve no knowledge of the Philip Pullman trilogy this series is based on other than the film The Golden Compass which my father and I watched a few years ago and didn’t finish.
There are some who are loyal to the books and don’t like the casting for the series or the way the story is being handled but dang! I enjoyed this show so much.
Annlyel Online 