Hello everyone. That was an exciting week. It marked the beginning of the 2021 Tribeca Film Festival, which is celebrating its 20th anniversary. The Festival kicked off with the world premiere of the highly anticipated musical IN THE HEIGHTS. Tribeca 2021 runs June 9-20 and is the first major North American film festival held in person after COVID-19. Since I’m based in Europe and I still can’t travel, I will be covering Tribeca from home. But I promise I will share my favorite films of the festival here.
This week also brought us the first episode of LOKI and it was everything I was hoping it would be. Fun, weird, and a bit dark. So far, much better than FALCON AND WINTER SOLDIER, which I thought was pretty boring.
Anyway, I hope you guys have a great weekend!
IN THE HEIGHTS
Lin-Manuel Miranda's hit Broadway musical (before HAMILTON) finally arrives at the cinemas and on HBO Max. IN THE HEIGHTS is about Washington Heights a neighborhood in New York City, the story focuses on a bodega owner who’s closing his store and retiring to the Dominican Republic after inheriting his grandmother’s fortune. As the first Broadway Musical with a primarily Latino cast, IN THE HEIGHTS made its debut in 2008 with Miranda in the cast.
I'm not really into musicals and I have not seen IN THE HEIGHTS on stage but I thought that the songs are very catchy and the lyrics are great, too. I don’t understand anything about dancing, to be honest, so I won’t comment on that. The cast is absolutely amazing, with so much talent. There were some great cameos in there as well. And I love the representation of many countries. The sets are beautiful and the cinematography and editing are very interesting. The only criticism I have is that the pacing was a little lackluster sometimes. And at 2 hours 23 minutes, the movie is overly long, in my opinion.
Overall I thought IN THE HEIGHTS was a very beautiful and well-made movie. A remarkable story of community and culture.
IN THE HEIGHTS is Out now in theaters and streaming on HBO Max
FLACK Season 2
FLACK is a British comedy-drama series written and created by Oliver Lansley and directed by Peter Cattaneo and George Kane. The series follows Anna Paquin as Robyn, an American PR executive who lives in London. As she navigates her own life she must clear up and help the lives of her clients. The first season was released in 2019, meaning fans have now waited for 2 years for season 2.
Half workplace comedy, half soap opera drama, the Amazon Prime series has a lot of sex, drugs, and celebrities behaving badly. Season 2 picks up where season one left off and amps up the emotional intensity inherent to its predecessor. With juicy storylines of celebrities being naughty, the creative pivots to cover things up, and the cutthroat practices of Paquin and her colleagues. The leading ladies played by Anna Paquin, Lydia Wilson, and Rebecca Benson really tie things together. And it is always very nice to see strong women represented on TV.
FLACK isn't prestige TV and some parts were a bit cliche. However, I found it entertaining and very interesting to witness the downward spiral of Robyn’s life. Like, her ability of self-destruction is absolutely stunning. The second season ends on a cliffhanger, and I'm rooting for the show to get a third one.
Amazon will make all six episodes of FLACK available to watch today, June 11.
Top 5 songs
These were the 5 songs on my heavy rotation this week. You can listen to them on Spotify and YouTube.
1 - Descendents - Nightage
2 - jxdn - Think About Me
3 - We Are The Union - Short Circuit
4 - Magnolia Park - tonight
5 - Lorde - Solar Power