2021 Movie
Dir. Lin-Manuel Miranda · United States of America · English, Spanish
An emotional musical biopic whose unwieldiness feels totally sincere
With its origins as a full-length rock monologue, it’s understandable if Tick, Tick… Boom! comes off as overly concerned with its protagonist’s personal anxieties and not the larger social and health crises happening right outside his door. But while it really doesn’t offer much insight into the AIDS epidemic, or even the art scene of 1990s New York, the helplessness that Jonathan Larson feels in the face of his own inability to save the world comes off as honest expression nonetheless. Andrew Garfield and a strong cast that includes Robin de Jesús and Vanessa Hudgens give purpose and energy to this somewhat messy character study that still manages to land its emotional beats.
On the brink of turning 30, a promising theater composer navigates love, friendship and the pressure to create something great before time runs out.
"For all the movie's dramatic delights, it betrays a lack of intimacy, of physicality, of time in motion."
— Richard Brody
"It really is a fascinating portrait of this one person's specific creative process."
— Bilge Ebiri
Struggling musical theater composer Jonathan Larson scrambles to finish the score he's writing before he turns 30 years old.
Tick, Tick... Boom!'s musical score is arguably about as unwieldy as Rent's (the real Jonathan Larson's final and most famous work), but its in the jittery, genre-blending quality of Larson's songs where the show really finds its identity. You can tell that Stephen Sondheim's laser precision was a big influence on Larson's writing, so it's also interesting to note how often his score deviates—coming across instead as a '90s mixtape of sorts, brimming with unabashed sentimentality and just a hint of improvisation. Individual songs might not always hit, but taken as an entire soundtrack, it always keeps you on your toes.
Every time one of these comes out, you can't help but think to yourself... how the hell did Bohemian Rhapsody get all that praise?
Oscars
2 noms
Golden Globes
4 noms
SAG Awards
1 nom
DGA
1 nom
WGA
1 nom
Emil Hofileña is a curator at A Good Movie to Watch. He also writes as a theater critic, with work published in Rogue and Out of Print, among others. He’s probably crying over a movie or an episode as we speak.
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