The ensuing loss of personal relationships is conveyed in the deeply tragic performances of Alexandra Shipp and Robin de Jesus as Girlfriend and Bestfriend,respectively, Jesus,specially, is splendidly tragic when the bestfriend contracts AIDS. If we are to believe Garfield then Larson was boyish charming and selfcentred to the point of not noticing his girlfriend and bestfriend’s deep sense of isolation and unhappiness from Larson as he ploughs along relentlessly towards the goal of achieving his dreams. I spent two hours watching Garfield bringing his own impish charm to the character. It also does disservice to the real-life character for the same reason. By getting ‘Spiderman’ Andrew Garfield to play the arresting Larson,the film does disservice as well as a favour to the iconic stage performer.įavour, because audiences immediately warm up to Garfield as Larson, since Garfield is a personable easily identifiable actor. Its hero is the real-life standup comic Jonathan Larson whom I knew nothing about until I saw this film. Tick Tick…Boom captures the innocence of the AIDS era beautifully. Then at least we fooled ourselves into believing that one got sick only if one did ‘it’ with another man. How much more reassuring that era of viral setbacks and random mortality seems as compared to the one that grips civilization now.
If you are into Vir Das, then you would probably enjoy the sassy stand-up acts of this film telescoping years of turmoil in the early 1990s when young aspirations were repeatedly nipped in the bud by AIDS.