SUENOS BONITOS: a review of "In The Heights"

"IN THE HEIGHTS"
Based upon the stage musical "In The Heights"
Book by Quiara Alegria Hudes   
Music and Lyrics by Lin-Manuel Miranda
Screenplay Written by Quiara Alegria Hudes
Directed by Jon M. Chu
**** (four stars)
RATED PG 13

Wondrous!!! 

What a time we live in, here in the 21st century, currently a period fraught with considerable tension, malice, inconsiderateness, insensitivity, selfishness, avarice, and purposeful cruelty, exacerbating the turbulence of our social/economic/political landscape and or collective national health and survival. It is a horrific time, one that has compartmentalized us from each other, whether physically, ideologically and spiritually. Honestly, now that we live in a world where empirical facts are questioned, nuance is non-existent as perceptions and beliefs have become so unforgivably binary. 

And then, there is the matter of race.

Never in my lifetime have I been a witness to acts of racism presented in such a severely overt manner.. It is the blatant inhumanity that is most hurtful. The cruelly willful inability to even try to honestly see the shared humanity between an individual, ethnic group or community that is different than the dominant White culture only further works to compartmentalize, reducing full human beings to fear based fantasy, disabling any ability to see each other properly and completely.   

It is such an exceedingly dark, grim period and just in time, here arrives a blinding ball of sunshine in the form of Jon M. Chu's "In The Heights," his deliriously joyous, visually luxurious, deeply felt adaptation of the Tony Award winning musical drama by Quiara Alegria Hudes and Lin-Manuel Miranda. While I am one that typically rejects any and everything that smacks of a certain forced merriment, "In The Heights," for all of its splendor, is cemented with a truthful gravitas and palpable respect and affection for the lives, experiences and souls of the people it is clearly celebrating. 

As with the stage musical, Jon M. Chu's "In The Heights," is centered around the collective of characters who reside in the predominantly Dominican neighborhood of Washington Heights of Upper Manhattan in New York City. The magnetic Anthony Ramos stars as Usnavi de la Vega, our film's narrator as well as the nearly 30 year old owner of the neighborhood bodega who dreams of returning to his native Dominican Republic in order to resurrect his late Father's business. 

Through Usnavi, we meet his teenage cousin Sonny de la Vega (Gregory Diaz IV), who works at the bodega and is undocumented; "Abuela" Claudia (Olga Merediz), the elderly neighborhood matriarch who raised Usnavi after the passing of his parents; Kevin Rosario (Jimmy Smits), owner of the local taxi company plus his daughter, troubled and homesick Stanford University student Nina (Leslie Grace); Usnavi's best friend Benny (Corey Hawkins), who is also Kevin's employee and Nina's neighborhood boyfriend; Daniela (Daphne Rubin-Vega), who owns the neighborhood saloon and her employees Carla (Stephanie Beatriz), Cuca (Dascha Polanco) and aspiring fashion designer Vanessa Morales (Melissa Barrera), upon whom Usnavi harbors a long standing unrequited crush; and finally, The Piraguero (Lin-Manuel Miranda), whose piragua business is threatened by the arrival of a Mister Softee truck.

As Usnavi weaves his story, we are all given a front row seat into the hopes and dreams of a community and its people, especially when faced with life challenges (a lengthy blackout in a sweltering summer) and greater tribulations (gentrification, financial struggles, feelings of displacement) and as told via a bounty of vigorously high spirited songs and musical sequences.

With regards to the movie musical, Jon M. Chu's "In The Heights" is a flat out winner from end to end. It is a dynamically energetic and beautifully first rate production propelled by Lin-Manuel Miranda's outstanding songs, the absolutely dazzling choreography by Christopher Scott, the luscious Cinematography by Alice Brooks and unquestionably the inventive, supremely warm, succulent direction by Chu, who guided his extraordinary cast to glory to a wealth of riches in performances, singing and dancing. 

Despite the varying genres of the actual songs, which range freely from selections heavily fused through salsa, hip-hop, and freestyle rap, for instance, "In The Heights" exists as much as a classic Hollywood musical as Gene Kelly and Stanley Donan's "Singin' In The Rain" (1952). The film positively soars with its stupendous opening salvo "In The Heights," the downright electrifying "The  Club" which itself is immediately followed by technicolored skyrockets of "Blackout," and, without question, a spectacular Busby Berkeley styled sequence set at a public swimming pool ("$96,000"). 

Elegant visual effects richly enhance the proceedings within "It Won't Be Long Now," as Vanessa dreams of a life as a fashion designer as the sky above her unfurls in lush fabrics and most vibrantly in a literally gravity defying ballet between Benny and Nina in "When The Sun Goes Down."  

But, where Chu's film and Lin-Manuel Miranda's songs speak their most impressive volumes are selections that speak directly from the inner lives of the characters with all of their wishes, frustrations, regrets, fears, failures and triumphs--precisely the very best songs that make our most beloved musicals so memorable and cherished, as we are seeing souls become music.   

With "No Me Diga" and the aforementioned, "It Won't Be Long Now," respectively, I loved witnessing the inner turmoil and parallel stories of both Nina and Vanessa, two young women with equally conflicting viewpoints of leaving their beloved neighborhood, venturing outwards from that security and questioning whether they are meant for a world outside of their own. The film's emotional peaks arrive as the characters fall into sorrow, beginning with "Abuela" Claudia's elegiac musical soliloquy "Paciencia y Fe," and continuing through the choral "Alabanza" and then further through revitalization via the soaring "Carnval del Barrio." 

What was so impressive to me was how Chu handled the extremely delicate balancing act of ensuring the pathos of the film and its characters remained so firmly intact while being filtered through the artifice of a musical with characters literally breaking into song. And again, the entire cast, so beautifully anchored by the sensational Anthony Ramos, absolutely all radiated from the screen, so obviously enraptured with the opportunity to tell the stories of their own culture and to do so with sheer joy.   

It feels more than fitting that I have seen this film immediately after seeing Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson's "Summer Of Soul (...or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised)" as both films are impassioned, celebratory odes to the culture, community, communion of a people. And in its depiction of a neighborhood deep in the sweltering heat of summer, Chu's film also greatly recalled, of all things, Spike Lee's "Do The Right Thing" (1989), which despite the brutal tragedy of its final sections, is an otherwise resplendent film overflowing with the natural joys and rhythms of life itself. 

Yet, most of all, as "In The Heights" showcases a variety of people who emerge from the various communities and cultures which constitute Mexican, Puerto Rican, those from Dominican Republic, Afro-Cuban, and Afro-Latino/Latinx, all residing together within this one neighborhood, we are indeed receiving a story of the immigrant experience. To that end, we are all also witnessing how through the interconnectivity of cultures and generations, variations of the same immigrant experience has continued to play out over and again, most notably, through the conflict of balancing assimilation into the new culture while retaining the culture from which one has originated, which even then leads us to the greater issues of how different cultures thrive and survive within a greater national community that so often vilifies them.  

Beautifully, "In The Heights" is decidedly not a film about cultural pain even though there are painful moments of doubt, failure, and tragedy. Chu has delivered an exceedingly humane film that boldly unveils a sheer resistance to the darkness of the world via the vitality and resilience of a community refusing to shadow its own collective light regardless of how determined the obstacles of life seem to wish to extinguish that light. And in that manner of representation and delivery, the messages of "In The Heights" are propulsive and paramount in its collective power, which so often can nearly raise you completely out of your seats through the dazzling grace of its energy and spirit.      

Jon M. Chu's "In The Heights," is a feast for the eyes, ears, heart and soul fueled with performances filtered through sheer elation, sparkling choreography, singing and some truly elegant visual effect yet is grounded in an intergenerational story of a people and community, richly represented and presented with bountiful truth and humanity. It is a film wise enough to know that not every story needs to be littered with tragedy and tears while deftly ensuring the inherent human drama remains intact. 

Sometimes, our stories necessitate being shared through the medium of uplift for it is so easy to fall into despair and holes so deep and ark that we are unable to see ourselves as we truly are, especially those of us in communities that are marginalized, discriminated against, abused and targeted. Stories of uplift or stories presented through uplift are designed to inspire. Not by any cliched sense of manufactured movie manipulation but through the act of being seen, being heard, being felt just as we are, therefore allowing us to see ourselves and inspire ourselves and hopefully, others outside of our respective communities will be able to see us as we are too.   

As the variety of characters within "In The Heights," all armed with their respective struggles, obstacles and challenges are ultimately echoes of each other, we are asked to find those same echoes within ourselves as we all navigate life in this ever expanding and evolving nation of immigrants. 

That is precisely what makes Jon M. Chu's "In The Heights" such a marvelous experience to behold as it is truth and resistance to darkness by way of song, dance, and the rich tapestry that exists within the familial bonds of a community. And it is also one of 2021's brightest and best films.

ARE YOU READY????: a review of "Summer Of Soul (...or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised)"

 

"SUMMER OF SOUL (...OR, WHEN THE REVOLUTION COULD NOT BE TELEVISED)"
Directed by Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson
**** (four stars)
RATED PG 13

I was born in 1969. 

For reasons that still remain ever so mysterious to me, I have always held this deep, to practically primal, relationship with my fascination with the 1960's. How enraptured I have always been, especially as a child, with newsreel stories that illustrated that decade's midpoint to the dawn of the 1970's, as American society was facing its cultural sea change due to the turbulence of the generation gap, the counter culture, the sexual revolution, the Vietnam war and unquestionably the Civil Rights movement. The aesthetics of the period, from fashion to hairstyles and of course, the continuously revolutionary and psychedelicized music, only helped to serve and shape a world view, the core of which, an admittedly more utopian ideal, still resides inside of me. 

I could see the chaos of the time only through snapshots of images and sounds, always wanting to gather a greater sense of what that time was really like. Yet, whenever I asked my parents to illuminate and flesh out my perceptions, the answers I was given were decidedly muted to completely unexciting, almost as if holes were being punctured into the balloon of illusion. While everything I had seen and read about contained truth, there was an even greater truth that my parents displayed to me: the sights I would see in archived news footage did not fully describe or represent what was happening or even not happening everywhere. I was repeatedly seeing one representation of a historical period, decidedly and truthfully, a representation delivered through the lens of Whiteness. And in doing so, how many other lenses, ones that would fully present the larger mosaic of society, were being unseen, therefore depleting a greater understanding of ourselves and the time period during which we co-existed?

Recently, I reviewed Director Sam Pollard's terrific documentary "Black Art: In The Absence Of Light," a work that lushly presented a largely unseen (or more truthfully, unacknowledged) collective of Black artists, historians, educators, curators, collectors, writers and journalists within the more European based canon of the art world. It is a film that beautifully exists to not only expand the nature of our perceptions of the medium of art, it more importantly and gorgeously extended itself to expand upon the Black consciousness of who we are and what we can be. For again, if we are not able to see ourselves, then we are denied the opportunities to be inspired by ourselves to become whatever we are able to ascend towards.

Ahmir Thompson, famously known as Questlove, drummer/songwriter/producer/bandleader of The Roots, as well as revered DJ, musicologist, author and Professor at the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music at New York University, has now expanded his copious gifts even further by becoming a film director and believe me, his debut is a grand slam!! "Summer Of Soul (or, When The Revolution Couldn't Be Televised)" is an electrifying, evocative and supremely emotional document of a cultural event that otherwise would have been lost to time. 

Much like the late Sydney Pollack and Producer Alan Eliot's extraordinary retrieval and full restoration of "Amazing Grace" (2019), the document of the late Aretha Franklin's live performance recording of her iconic "Amazing Grace" double album (released June 1, 1972), material that was shelved and unseen for 47 years, what Questlove has achieved is akin to a movie miracle. In addition to rescuing a mass of unseen and superlative performance footage from some of the peak Black musical artists of soul, blues, pop and gospel of its day, the film, like the very best documentaries, transcends the immediate subject matter to unveil an impassioned statement of the evolution of Black consciousness 52 years ago and how it mirrors that continued evolution within the 21st century. And furthermore, the film serves as a dissertation about the nature of our perception of our collective history.

Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson's "Summer Of Soul" details the experience of the Harlem Cultural Festival, an event held over six weekends in Harlem's Mt. Morris Park at which over 300,000 people attended. And, stunningly...the event was FREE to the public! 

The festival, as produced and directed by nightclub singer Tony Lawrence, with aid from the then Republican New York Mayor John Lindsey, was designed as a testament and tribute to Black pride and culture, and arrived as the Civil Rights movement, grim sequence of political assassinations of President John F. Kennedy (1963), Malcolm X (1965), Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy (both 1968), the rise of President Nixon and the overall social/political/economic landscape of the nation, and Black America in particular, was reaching a combustible apex. 

Despite attracting performers on the level of B.B. King, Gladys Knight and the Pips, Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach, Hugh Masakela, Sly and the Family Stone and so many more, plus attaining corporate sponsorship from Maxwell House and General Foods and even then, having the entirety of the event completely filmed, the contents of the festival have been unbelievably unseen ever since...until now.

Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson's "Summer Of Soul" is a stunning, sun soaked film of community and communion, firmly settling itself next to the likes of Mel Stuart's "Wattstax" (1973), Michel Gondry's "Dave Chappelle's Block Party" (2005) and the aforementioned "Amazing Grace." Featuring new interviews with some of the festival's performers as well as some of the patrons who attended the series when they were in their late teens, Questlove has delivered an unabashed labor of love, a fervent poem to the community of Harlem, a valentine to a specific time and place in Black culture and history, and an outstanding musical artifact of a time and period during which Black artists existed to enrich and enliven as well as entertain. 

Leave it to a drummer on the level of Questlove to essentially open his film with a drum solo, one performed by none other than a then 19 year old Stevie Wonder no less!! Yet, instead of being anything approaching self indulgence, the sequence is a fireworks display of a performance, preparing us for the dynamic presentation to follow, while also brilliantly accenting the cultural undercurrent and purpose of the festival itself, in the past as well as the present. 

From purely the standpoint of a music documentary, "Summer Of Soul" is first rate from end to end. From the stoned soul picnic vibes of The Chambers Brothers' "Uptown," David Ruffin's "My Girl," and Gladys Knight and the Pips' "I Heard It Through The Grapevine" to the soaring songs of Black togetherness as witnessed in The Edwin Hawkins Singers' "Oh Happy Day," to the sweat and fire of B.B. King's "Why I Sing The Blues," every single musical sequence is a showstopper. 

Instead of serving itself up simply as a parade of stars, which would have easily been more than good enough considering the high quality of the performances themselves, I deeply appreciated how Questlove and his interview subjects made great strides to provide a larger context to the music being seen and heard. Within this festival, and therefore this film, music is not a passive event. It is designed for you to engage with it, to attain a complete experience as the music is a form of communication, conversation and connective tissue from performer to audience, from one racial group to another, from us to ourselves and from ourselves to our ancestors and back again. To that end, we are then able to see the interconnectivity between the music styles and genres themselves, all of which are elements of the Black history which birthed all of them.

With the performances of Mongo Santamaria, Ray Barretto, Herbie Mann, and Hugh Masakela, the film showcases the linkage between the music and communities of Black, Latino, African, Puerto Rican, and Afro-Cuban, all of whom resided within Harlem. We can hear the blues of Pops Staples' guitar in The Staple Singers' gospel, as well as influences of gospel in the righteous funk of Sly and the Family Stone's "Higher." And in one of the film's most musically explosive sequences, we bear witness to a sky scorching duet between the inimitable Mavis Staples and Mahalia Jackson (!), and really, what was more rock and roll than that?!

Beyond the actual music, the festival, and now the film, affords us the opportunity to bask in the presentation of ourselves in ways that challenge and expand our own horizons into what and how we, as Black people, are able to envision ourselves. As previously stated, 1969 was truly a psychedelicized time as a more conservative (i.e. White American) appearances and attire gave way to the cultural changes towards presenting ourselves through more African themed clothing as well as our unapologetically natural hairstyles. 

The decidedly psychedelic outfits of The 5th Dimension, in addition to their hybrid sound of soul, pop and folk, was a quietly revolutionary act in and of itself when it came to the perceptions of what beautiful Black people could look and sound like. Sly and the Family Stone, in particular, was the most radical group in attendance in mere appearance alone, from the band's wardrobe to the sight of a mixed race/mixed gender band of musical equals (therefore pre-dating what we would see from Prince more than a decade later).

Yet, most of all, it was remarkable to see over and again throughout the film, from performers to audience members, the sense of awe felt when witnessing a veritable sea of Black people shoulder to shoulder in harmony and without incident, unveiling a deep celebration of self while also and in essence fully challenging the perceived inherent sense of wrongdoing and evil of Blackness. 

How clever it was of Questlove to have as one of the very first images in the film, an announcement over the PA system of an audience member's lost wallet, which was found and could be reclaimed. Questlove also presented how we, as Black people, were so effectively able to self govern as the Black Panthers provided security for the entirety of the event (as the New York City police department initially refused to perform the job but eventually assisted) without conflict. Seeing every moment succeed was indeed the powerful message necessary to be received during a time when we left the concept of the "Negro" behind and claimed "BLACK" as our cultural identifier, one that was committed to cultivating the Black excellence that resides within ourselves and delivered from ourselves to ourselves in an incendiary musical sermon by Nina Simone and her shattering recitation of the poem "Are You Ready?"

Questlove's "Summer Of Soul" so richly provided a sprawling canvas on which we, as Black people, are represented so lovingly and fully, that we, again, are afforded the opportunity to see ourselves in ways we typically do not within media sources. Seeing each other in such a powerfully inspiring and beautiful light allows us to help us to SEE us and I can only imagine what a film like this would have been like if it were viewed by the masses in 1969.

Which leads us to the mystery and miracle of what Questlove has achieved with "Summer Of Soul," for why was a document such as this now seen for over 50 years? As the film informs us, back in 1969, there was no interest to be gathered from sources who could then attain and distribute the visual contents of this festival and broadcast them nationwide for what was deemed to be solely "a Black show." Even when attempts to capitalize upon juggernaut that was Woodstock, by referring to the Harlem Cultural Festival as "the Black Woodstock," no interest was gathered whatsoever. And so, the footage sat, leaving the art, the music, the people and the time, lost to memory and time...as if it had never happened at all. 

At the outset of this review, I essentially asked the question regarding the nature of what history is. In my mind, history is the collective experience of all those who have lived through the experience and not solely the document of the one or the few who have the access to record, document and then present that particular account because in doing so, we are treated to only a certain perspective rather than the mosaic of life and lives lived. Yes, there are facts. But, just the facts do not represent the fullness of truth. Again, my fascination withthelate1960's is founded and cemented in the images and sounds that have been presented over time and decidedly through that aforementioned lens of Whiteness. 

With regards to Questlove's "Summer Of Soul" (and to a certain extent, Mel Stuart's "Wattstax" as it is a film which is rarely seen or mentioned these days) Michael Wadleigh's "Woodstock" and that festival itself is the proverbial elephant in the room regarding this period of time in American history. Now do not get me wrong, I LOVE "Woodstock"!!!! I vividly remember when I first saw it and how much of it blew my head apart and even served to jet fuel my '60's fascination, to the point where Jimi Hendrix's rendition of "The Star Spangled Banner" is the definitive version in my soul. 

And that, is where I take issue now...  

Woodstock, the three day festival, which also occurred in 1969 (and less than100 miles away from Harlem at that in Bethel, New York) and the subsequent Michael Wadleigh documentary film released in 1970 alongside the soundtrack album (released May 11, 1970), is the definitive statement, the benchmark concert film, the watershed statement of the counter culture in America and because of its cemented in stone status, it is the ONLY statement. 

But why???? 

And who are the powers that be that have anointed it to that pedestal? Maybe it would've ascended to those heights naturally but why not have that festival plus others held, and therefore filmed, during that exact same time co-exist to represent a larger palate of the period? Why does there have to be only one and one that, again exists through the lens of Whiteness? 

Yes, certainly the presence of Richie Havens and Santana injected and suggested that wider lens through which to view that period--and truthfully, the level of Blackness contained in Hendrix's fireworks are as unquestionable as they are untouchable--but Woodstock is filtered through a White perspective, one that people of color could be invited into but it is a White perspective nonetheless.  

Beyond the performances, beyond the politics, beyond the presentation of Black culture and pride in 1969, the movie miracle of what Questlove's "Summer Of Soul" has achieved is found in downright startling moments and sequences when we view performers and audience members in present day watching the footage of what was thought to be forever lost, except within their own memories, which by this point may be hazy enough to almost feel as if it were a dream.  

Just take a moment to ponder. So many of the performers themselves have passed on without having seen this footage and the audience members who were 19 years old at the time of the festival are now 71, making 52 years of holding onto memories that are unvalidated due to the actual material confirming those memories being hidden. What if they could have been re-watched and therefore, re-introduced for all of this time? But it wasn't and this serious omission results in an erasure of history, a history that would have served a greater purpose than just harboring a collection of songs. 

At one point, an audience member now aged 71, tearfully regards the footage and exclaims, "I'm not crazy!" Precisely!!!! Because what he knew to be true but could not reach or touch or prove due to the shortsightedness, accidental or intentional, of others, has denied a culture the right and opportunity to regard itself in order to see itself, learn from itself and rejoice in itself. 

Yet, now in 2021,we can.

Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson's 'Summer Of Soul (...or When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised)" is a film of reclamation as well as one to be rejoiced, for we now all can see how beautiful it was and how beautiful it is! 

And it is also one of the very best films of 2021.

SAVAGE CINEMA'S COMING ATTRACTIONS FOR JULY 2021

Will this be the month I try to make my grand return to the movies?

I still do not know for certain as my anxiety due to Covid has not waned in the least and my trepidation for taking that dive into the deep end of a re-opening world while the pandemic still exists does not set well with me but then...I cannot stay away forever. I cannot allow fear to guide my life, especially wile being vaccinated and still taking my own precautions via wearing a mask. 

Yet...we will see. Regardless, Savage Cinema continues and although last month was interrupted again by life responsibilities, I am happy to announce that a full, brand new review of a just released film is written and ready to be shared with you and I am going to try and sneak in one more film to keep those creative juices flowing. 

And so...I wont make any promises for the month and I also do not wish to waste your more than valuable time. Just please continue to be safe so we can all feel confident to return to what we all love so dearly.