From the Director of the crowd favorite film of 2014 and triple Oscar winning film, “Whiplash,” came another music-obsessed film, “La La Land.” This movie isn't just drenched in nostalgia for bygone Hollywood musicals- it feels like it could be one.
Staring Emma Stone as Mia, an up and coming actress working as a barista on the Warner Bros. lot, and Ryan Gosling’s character, Sebastian, a down on his luck Jazz pianist with aspirations for owning his own club. The movie follows their dreams and romance throughout the course of a year.
From the very beginning, with a classically styled “Summit Entertainment” logo and the proud display of “filmed in CinemaScope,” it’s clear that this film loved musicals. Musicals specifically from the stylistic era of the 1952 hit film “Singin’ in the Rain”- and while it's one thing to be nostalgic and pay tribute- it is another entirely to still triumph as a film on its own.
Triumph it does. Every musical number and scene feels like a technicolor burst of whimsy. Not only is the film visually appealing, but Gosling and Stone’s portrayal of their respective characters feel as actors from a vintage era, tap dancing and singing in every scene, while still having the gravitas required for smaller, more dramatic moments.
“La La Land” feels like a dream. Warm colors and an overall blue palette makes the film feel as the kind of movie that lays right in the sweet spot of thinking about it without feeling the need to over analyze it. Doing a delicate balancing act of showing the silver screen dreams of the past and present, while still understanding that things aren't always sunshine and rainbows, the film is authentic; almost as if this world, where people dance and sing on top of their cars, really exists.
Any more specifics of what makes this film great are far too difficult to describe due to spoilers, but nevertheless, “La La Land” feels like a film that shouldn't exist, given our age of modernity. It’s the type of movie that doesn’t get made anymore, and the fact that it does exists and is so pure- astounds. “La La Land” is not only the best movie I have seen all year, it is the best movie I have seen in many years.
5/5
Photo Courtesy of Summit Entertainment, Black Label Media, TIK Films, Impostor Pictures, Gilbert Films, and Marc Platt Productions.
