In The Heights review

Is EVERY big movie delayed from 2020 to 2021 great? Is this just going to be a thing? 

In The Heights is the big new musical based off a Lin Manuel Miranda show that he did before he really got big. It's set in a largely Dominican neighborhood in NYC during mostly a few hot summer days. It's like Do The Right Thing, except they're all Latin and they all get along. And there's music.

Musicals have been back for about 20 years now. Many have been okay, but I've only REALLY liked a few of them. I'll go to bat for Les Miserables, Sweeney Todd,  and Rent. Rent is a fucking masterpiece and I will fight you on that. 

In The Heights is as good as any of those. Maybe better. There is genuine bonafide movie magic on display here, particularly in the first half of the movie that is just one dazzler after another.

The main lead is Anthony Ramos, and Ramos is just a charisma machine in this. He will be a big star. But he's not alone. His love interest is the stunning Melissa Barrera, who I had never seen in anything but now want to see in everything. And even more jaw dropping is Leslie Grace, a first time actor who has her own major role here as the daughter of Jimmy Smits who is back home from college. You can never be sure on these things (I was buying all the Samantha Barks stock after Les Mis and then she's barely been in a movie since), but Grace needs to be a major thing. 

The whole ensemble is very good. And almost every major character gets a big music number. I'm not sure if these songs are the kind of songs I would listen to independent of the movie, but in the movie they are all good. This may be the only musical I have seen in which I liked every song. There's really not a bad one. And they're all carried off with an infectious exuberance. This is such a happy movie. It's disarming. 

That first hour or so is pretty much perfect. Then the movie does take a dip as it gets a little more into the plot, and I don't think it's a coincidence the movie is just a little less captivating when Grace kind of fades out of the story for a while.  But it rebounds for a feel good finish (and we finally get a good How I Met Your Mother finale).

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