Hamilton 2020
Hamilton has been a blockbuster on stage, winning tons of Tony awards and selling out months in advance despite amazingly expensive tickets. For the poor and patient, they made a movie version, filmed in 2016, but kept from audiences to keep people flocking to the live show. The nice thing about this is they filmed the award winning cast after they had performed months of shows. Rather than try to make a real movie out if it, they filmed the actual stage show, which again, means the performers are in their element. I recently re-watched Stop Making Sense, one of the all-time great concert movies, which worked because they kept a great show intact, but used the camera for quick takes and close-ups. Hamilton, the movie gives you a better seat than any budget could get you, for only the price of Disney Plus. I’m sure it is more exciting live, but just like with a football game, you see more on the screen than you can see in person. Maybe someday they will make a more conventional movie version, but I am not sure it can surpass seeing the show where it was created to be performed.
With all of the hype, I still wondered if the movie could really live up to it. There is a lot of rap, most of it really fast, maybe kind of in the style of Eminem, with frequently brilliant rhyming, sung so quickly it is sometimes hard to take in. I was happy that there are also a lot of more conventional songs, which are usually very good, to break things up (not long after filming this, Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote most of the big songs for Moana). To add even more energy there is almost constant dancing and movement, including from a rotating centerstage.The show starts off as an intriguing idea, but it quickly becomes apparent that this is an amazing performance on a lot of levels, plus the story itself is full of great events and characters, not least of which is Hamilton’s own life story. Not necessarily intending to watch all the way through, I wound up watching about three quarters of the 3-hour movie in the first sitting. Not sure if that hurt or the tone just kind of changed, but that last quarter the next day seemed heavier and slower than the rest of the movie and a bit of a letdown, though you pretty much know the ending beforehand.
While Lin-Manuel Miranda in the title role is the backbone, the other cast members also get great songs and knock them out of the park. Again, going with the broadway players, these people can really sing, unlike a movie version where big names would have been brought in, too often overlooking their song and dance abilities. Most of the castmembers play a couple of roles, which works better than I would have thought, but I think the whole concept is so obviously a big show that it is easy to accept just about anything. Anyway, I really enjoyed the movie and am glad they decided to bring this legendary show to screen without messing with it.
Update seven weeks later: Because there is a lot to absorb the first time through, and a lot of it seems to go flying by at high speed, I wanted to watch again. It is still just as good and does drag towards the end, though I don’t know if there was a way around it. There are at least six very, very good songs, generously distributed to most of the cast. With those anchor points, you can forgive a few lulls. Having it available on Disney Plus is nice because you can just go to certain songs if you want. Yes, King George’s song, but so many of them are so well done they can stand on their own.
Written: 04 Jul 2020