La La Land (Damien Chazelle, December 2nd 2016) Movie • Page 4

Going for round two today. I've had the soundtrack on repeat since I saw it last week.

 

Do I have to see this? It didn't make Slant's or Film Comment's list.

 

I think he just learned jazz on the piano. He already knew how to play, as he played piano on the Dead Man's Bones album.

 

Wondering the same thing. And if I historically loathe musicals will this do anything to change my mind?

 

No, it won't and this is coming from someone who loved it.

 

If the unrealistic tropes bother you you might not like it, I loved it but I have some affinity for musicals

 

I've despised musicals in the past, but for whatever reasons this film didn't feel like a traditional musical, and so somehow I loved it.

 

Have you watched any of Jacques Demy's musicals? The Umbrellas of Cherbourg and The Young Girls of Rocherfort are legit masterpieces. In my top 25 or so of all time. And I don't really fuck with musicals either.

This apparently riffs on his films as well as the the classic Hollywood stuff. David Ehrlich called this Demy for the digital age, but I'm finding myself to agree with his opinions less and less.

I'm still looking forward to catching this next week.

 

If I had to guess I don't think you'd care for it. It definitely has issues, but it hit me the right way personally. There are some strong negative takes on the film that I don't disagree with.

 

It comes out the day before I leave for my trip but it is a thirty mile drive. If it was closer I would see it; Whiplash was good but not great.

 

Thanks for all those answers! I understand musicals have a place, but breaking into song in any narrative (tv/movie) has never sat well with me outside of maybe Bobs Burgers haha. I will definitely give this a shot though, because who knows

I haven't seen either of those, no! I've got a lot of catch up to do though so will add em to my watchlist

 

I'd say the songs make a little more sense in the context of the movie, especially "Audition." And there's not a whole lot of songs, maybe like 5 or 6, so it's not like "Les Mis." That might help out. But it's just as fantastical and bombastic as any other musical, so I don't think there will be a lot of musical converts from this.

 

I'm not really into musicals but this was magical.

 

A second viewing and I like this a hell of a lot more. I still have some real issues with their argument scene, none of Gosling's complaints are dramatized, he accuses her of only liking him when he's down because it makes her feel better about herself, but that is nowhere in this film. He's resentful of her because of a choice he made, he took a steady job because he thought it was what she wanted, so when she has issues with it he's upset with her, but they never talk about it with each other for a second of screentime. Now, if this is a movie about how Gosling is an asshole who fucked things up with a girl he loves, that's one thing. But nothing in the resolution of the film comes back to it or makes that point. It feels like it's trying to be a movie about two people who just couldn't quite make it work, but it doesn't stick that point because Emma Stone doesn't do anything wrong, she doesn't mess up at all, it's all on Gosling. So when they watch that final film together, what is she regretting? What's the melancholy looking back on what might have been supposed to mean to her? That she didn't stay with a dick who prioritized poorly? It's a little maddening.

But I did like it a lot more as a whole second time through. Emma Stone's audition scene has brought me pretty close to tears both times. I love that Gosling isn't trying to be James Dean anymore, in the Nice Guys he was hapless and emotive and it was amazing, and here he's a stubborn jazz nerd with none of the broody posturing he was doing from 2006-2013. It's refreshing.

 

I also wish the movie cared as much about Emma Stone's one woman show as it did about Gosling's jazz. We see him playing constantly but don't get even a line that she wrote

 

Just saw this today with the family. I really enjoyed it personally, but I'm a sucker for excellently executed musical sequences. Chazelle was really just FLEXING the entire 128 minutes and I mostly fell for it. However, I agree with @Nathan on the deficiencies in Gosling's character during the argument scene. I just didn't fully buy that he actually thought Mia ever looked down on him to feel better about herself. Also, the critiques on the problematic nature of the whiteness of Chazelle's Jazz are dead on, and I don't really disagree with a lot of the more scathing critiques. That being said, I think for what it was, this was pretty charming, but I understand if someone else wouldn't be able to get past those issues.

 

La La Land’s White Jazz Narrative

I really wish this happened tbh. As charming and great as Gosling is in the role, I do think having a black actor play the character of an artist staying true to the roots of jazz would ring truer and more powerful than the whitesplained version of "true jazz" Gosling offers.

Gosling is charming as hell and knocks this role out of the park, but idk it's just hard to fully get on board with him as he parades around all these black idols and black people are largely absent from the film.

It doesn't really ruin my enjoyment of the film overall, but it definitely prevented me from loving it as much as I maybe could have.

 

I like really hated this.

 

I just saw it again and I still really enjoyed it, some of the scenes are brilliant and the tone and color palette are lovely but the treatment of jazz is just really confusing to me, it's like they address my issues with it in the movie but go against them. Best example is the first scene in the lighthouse gosling is talking about how people just talk over jazz while simultaneously talking directly over the jazz?

As problematic as the "academic white jazz" aspect of it is, I think it's also naive of the movie to essentially show audience that "new jazz" is just pop music when there are really good artist out there staying true to jazz while also doing something new with it. Even if they had cast someone else in Gosling's part it still would of bugged me when John Legend has some really good points and is never addressed again and then it just portrays the music as being shitty. That first rehearsal sounds so bad, the director clearly has not listened to any FlyLo or actual electronic jazz inspired music and then the second song isn't even jazz at all lol

 

I thought the John Legend music was good but I also prefer pop and funk to jazz

 

I had no idea John Legend was in this so for most of his parts I was focusing on adjusting to the fact that he was even in the film haha

He did a pretty decent job though, despite his very underwritten part

 

I had no idea that this was going to be as "old Hollywood musical" as it was. (If that makes sense)
I found it to be a little long. It was a gorgeous film with great dance sequences but the story didn't really pull me.

 

Yesss this bothered me too. I thought Gosling's character would maybe "learn a lesson" or whatever from Legend's character, because what he said about him admiring the revolutionaries but insisting on being such a traditionalist made so much sense.

 

i feel like the movie would be better without that scene just because of how frustrating this is lol