It is funny, but I enjoyed the Hamilton Revolution book more than the film. The insight of Miranda’s brain and thoughts made the story more compelling as his life was put into parts of lyrics.
Not only is it more important to listen to the songs first, but there is more emotion, thought, and precision in the recorded music (found in spotify and youtube) than the actual film. This is because, obviously, it was live recorded. The movement and pauses create a different sense of storyline that has to match what you are seeing, though, the music by itself creates such imagery in your head.
As my film production professor always says, there is a reason why silent films no longer exist and radio still does. Sound is the most important part of a film, a film could be horrible but if the sound is amazing, it is capable of winning awards.
Listening to the musical by itself through spotify, as I do every single day lol, gives you the same effect as watching the film. In fact, you lose key moments watching the film since the lyrics are carefully written to stand on its own. Hence, the reason they released the recorded music FIRST.
The musical film has the same style as Daft Punk’s Discovery Album.
Every song covers a part of the story, just that in Hamilton, the lyrics stand alone compared to Daft Punk’s songs.
Nevertheless, the film is good, but not as good as the best thing you can own if you like Hamilton,
If you check out the comments on the song on http://genius.com/7860613 you'll see Lin confirms the homage and the call to JRB.
If you like this, check out the rest of the stuff for Hamilton on Genius. It really is amazing. Or check out https://www.amazon.com/Hamilton-Revolution-Lin-Manuel-Miranda/dp/1478913649 and get all of Lin's thoughts on the songs.