Musical film "In the Heights": A musical to melt into

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In the Heights cast Anthony Ramos, Melissa Barrera:

Photo: Macall Polay / Warner Bros.

Summer doesn't even look that nice in the ice cream commercials.

Children can be sprinkled with fire water from cranked hydrants, the sun shines on confectionery stands and colorful house fronts, on the streets beautiful young people dance their everyday worries out of their bodies.

"In the Heights" is the name of the music film set in the steamy heat of Washington Heights, New York, from the workshop of the writer and composer Lin-Manuel Miranda, who has become world famous thanks to the successful musical "Hamilton".

The film, which is now opening in German cinemas, is not only a wonderfully cheerful dance, it also vibrates a little with political ambition.

Many of the people in the district where the hero played by Anthony Ramos with the funny name Usnavi (his father named him after a ship labeled "US Navy") runs a small grocery store, have ancestors in the Dominican Republic or other countries Central and Latin America - and no papers.

They are so-called "dreamers" who hope to get a residence permit in the USA.

The policies of US President Donald Trump, who resigned in January this year, wanted to destroy this hope for good.

And so the men and women rap, sing and dance in "In the Heights" explicitly against the attempts to isolate themselves from a society that likes to use illegally living migrants as cheap labor, but denies them the opportunity to advance.

How it is an impressive mixture of anger, glowing love and enthusiasm for New York that drives the film inside, more precisely: cheers.

Cheers to the community spirit!

The shop owner Usnavi's love belongs to the proud Vanessa (Melissa Barrera), who likes his awkward compliments, but considers his dream of opening a Caribbean beach bar in the homeland of the forefathers to be romantic nonsense. Vanessa herself would rather make it big as a fashion designer in New York. »In the Heights« is by no means about power conflicts within a New York neighborhood characterized by migrants, such as Leonard Bernstein's and Stephen Sondheim's »West Side Story« from the 1950s, which director Steven Spielberg plans to present in a new theatrical version at the end of the year. Lin-Manuel Miranda's musical homage to Washington Heights is the evocation of a grandiose neighborly community feeling.

In the summer heat in north Manhattan, all Heights residents talk and dream of very similar dream visions that have to do with wealth, happiness and recognition.

The second female main character in the musical, the student Nina (Leslie Grace), has come a long way and has just returned from her first year at Princeton - but unfortunately she was

marginalized

there by white

rich kids

because of her origins.

Survival spirit and a good mood

In fact, "In The Heights" is not so much about the obstacles that block people's path to a funny, loving and saturated coexistence, but about overcoming them through brave fighting spirit and good humor.

The musical was created long before »Hamilton« and was staged in 2005 - and even more than its predecessor, it is a celebration of the opportunities and promises of luck that people from all over the world, rightly or not, associate with the USA.

The director Jon M. Chu, who among other things had a hit with the film "Crazy Rich Asians", seems to be at work with particular enthusiasm in his "In the Heights" film when he shows his protagonists in hers Stopping the eagerness to talk - and finally encouraging them to rap, sing and dance again.

He lets them jump up on the fronts of houses while lifting the force of gravity and take part in a touching parade of flags that are crazy about their origins. Of course, this musical film is about financial worries and homesickness, lovesickness and even an electricity blackout. Nevertheless, he never leaves any doubt that he is set in a paradise. This is not on a beach in the Caribbean, but on a rocky island in the Hudson called Manhattan.