Vivo
Directed by Kirk DeMicco
Screenplay by Kirk DeMicco & Quiara Alegría Hudes
Story by Peter Barsocchini & Quiara Alegría Hudes
Produced by Lisa Stewart, Michelle L.M. Wong & Rich Moore
Starring Lin-Manuel Miranda, Zoe Saldana, Juan de Marcos, Brian Tyree Henry, Michael Rooker, Nicole Byer, Ynairaly Simo & Gloria Estefan
Cinematography Yong Duk Jhun
Edited by Erika Dapkewicz
Music by Alex Lacamoire
Vivo isn’t going to make anyone forget last year’s brilliant, Oscar-winning Soul, but it has its own charms. A Havana street musician Andrés Hernández (played engagingly by Juan de Marcos González) gets a letter from an old flame (Marta, played by Gloria Estefan) who moved to Miami (presumably before 1959) and is wrapping up a long and successful singing career and wants Andrés to come to the United States to join her in her finalé. He loves the idea, although Vivo, the eponymous kinkajou who is his pet/co-star (Lin-Manuel Miranda), is deeply skeptical. Like all kinkajous, Vivo speaks perfect English but humans are too dumb to understand him.
Andrés is wildly excited, especially since he finds a sheet of paper with the song he wrote for her way back when. Unfortunately, he dies in his sleep that night. The sheet of music blows out the window because that’s what sheets of music always do, and Vivo gives chase, retrieving the paper and encountering Gabi, an odd nine-year-old girl with purple hair and a talent for rapping. Gabi, an American, is returning to Miami in a few days, and between Andrés’ funeral and the music puts two and two together and realizes that she must get this music to Marta before her performance, along with an explanation of why Andrés himself couldn’t be there.
Gabi smuggles Vivo into the US because any nine year old girl can easily smuggle a 35 pound animal into the US at will, and they set out for Miami. They miss the bus, are waylaid by Gabi’s girl troopers who expect her to sell cookies, and wind up in the everglades, peopled with annoying flamingos and the absolute best animated snake villain since Rango.
It’s a lightweight film, glossing over the sorry history of US/Cuba relations and most of the characters are, well, cartoonish. But the musical score by itself makes the movie worth watching, and the Cubans are treated with respect, if glossed over.
The kids will like it, and the music gives it enough heft that adults that like the genre will enjoy the movie.
Now on Netflix.