"La La Land" Review

La La Land is a romantic musical comedy-drama film directed and written by Damien Chazelle and starring Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, John Legend, Rosemarie DeWitt, Sonoya Mizuno, Callie Hernandez, Jessica Rothe, Finn Wittrock, and J.K. Simmons. It follows the story of Mia (Stone), a barista and aspiring young actress in modern-day Los Angeles who happens upon multiple chance encounters with Sebastian (Gosling), a burgeoning jazz pianist just recently fired from his monotonous job playing Christmas carols in a pseudo-fancy restaurant. Sebastian has a dream of opening his own jazz club and dedicating it to reviving the dying genre of jazz music, making it the hottest club in L.A. and bringing jazz back to its roots. Mia dreams of performing a one-woman show and then moving to Paris to become a serious actress. The two connect through their respect for the other's artistic ambitions and a romance soon blossoms. What follows is an old-time Hollywood style musical set in the modern day, and my favorite film of the year.

Every so often, a movie, song, book, TV show, or some piece of art comes into your life at just the right time and seems like it was made specifically for you. It takes your current worries, ambitions, and feelings and lays them out threadbare for you in a way that makes you question whether your countenance with it was purely coincidence. I've had my share of these experiences, even a few times in the last couple years, but they're still very rare. This is what La La Land was for me. It feels like Damien Chazelle looked inside my brain and pieced together the exact film that would lift my spirits at this exact time.

Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone have an on-screen chemistry for the ages. Their relationship was the primary selling point of Crazy Stupid Love, and the popularity of the two of them as an on-screen couple has only strengthened since, and La La Land catapults them to Humphrey Bogart/Lauren Bacall status. This is a movie couple stuck out of time, both of them impossibly attractive, multi-talented, and dripping with beguiling charm and a way of interacting with each other on camera that you can't believe they're not together in real life. This is career-best work for both of them, and the cast of supporting players, while rather sparse in screen time, hold their own, most notably John Legend in an interesting turn as a revisionist jazz artist.

This film is exhaustive in its construction as an old-fashioned musical. Most attempts at reviving glitzy, glamorous, old-fashioned musicals of the last few decades have been done with an air of irony or self-reference, whereas La La Land commits fully to giving us an old style in a new setting, though not without its share of finely-tuned postmodernist self-awareness. Justin Hurwitz's score and songs are simply wonderful, and take heavy cues from the best of Jacques Demy and Vincente Minnelli. Some musical purists argue the songs in this film are quite simplistic, but for one thing, something being done almost perfectly shouldn't be downplayed by it not being entirely complex, and for another thing, the simplicity (and familiarity) of the music makes a lot of sense thematically for our characters and story, a point I'll expound upon in a minute.

The musical numbers are memorable, toe-tapping, and visually resplendent. Of particular note is the film's opening number, "Another Day of Sun", taking place on a backed-up Los Angeles freeway as dozens of dancers leave their idle cars and sing and dance on top of the hoods of vehicles in a brilliant, complicated, effortlessly flowing sequence done in one uninterrupted take. As far as technical achievement, this scene is the Revenant bear attack or opening shot of Gravity, but for musicals. In fact, every sequence in the film, musical or otherwise, is dripping with technical mastery. Linus Sandgren's cinematography captures the vibrant, old-fashioned, colorful sets and costumes to underscore the film's generally cheery tone, and the movie never stops dazzling. Moody blue sunsets, orange sun-drenched streets, bright and busy movie sets, sumptuously lit clubs and theaters, and a sequence taking place in a planetarium that quite literally violates the laws of physics. In short, La La Land offers moviegoers some of the most breathtakingly beautiful imagery you'll see all year.

While singing, tap dancing, waltzing, and dress-swaying are in no short supply in La La Land, the movie has a surprising number of exceptionally well-executed scenes of dialogue. Sebastian's explanation of why jazz is so dear to him, his pre-audition pep talk for Mia, their candlelit dinner turned career planning session, and a discussion with John Legend's character about traditionalism vs. revisionism are great dramatic seasoning to this primarily melodic affair. Included as well are some well-meaning jabs at Los Angeles culture and the entertainment industry, giving a tongue-in-cheek ribbing to the wide-eyed optimism of L.A. newcomers and specifically a great gag about a popular car model.

La La Land is ultimately a film about ambition and nostalgia, and more specifically about a concept that has always intrigued and moved me - the phenomenon of art connecting with someone on a visceral, emotional level, and that person then being so driven by that connection to try to recreate that connection with others. Sebastian and Mia aren't concerned with wealth, but with sharing what they've always loved. The film expands further from there, factoring in our loved ones' influence on our art and our lives. Sebastian and Mia don't try to recreate their feelings through art alongside each other; their dedication and craft are supplemented by their knowing each other. Don't mistake this for cloying sentimentality or faux-optimistic sap, though - the film has a quiet air of melancholy underneath it, and does not leave heartstrings unpulled, but I want to leave you with what I've said so far so you can see the movie, get where I'm coming from, and ponder for yourself.

I really cannot sing this movie's praises enough. La La Land is filled with clever homages, brilliant musical numbers, and dazzling visuals, communicating its themes in the language of both film and music. It's vibrant, bright, energetic, bittersweet, charming, passionate, magical, nostalgic, romantic, sweet, and impeccably crafted in basically every way. I'd recommend this film to anyone with a soul, but for cinephiles, musical junkies, and those with a flicker of romanticism in their hearts especially, this film will likely sweep you off your feet as it did mine. The levity and peace it gave me regarding my own relationship, my own ambitions, and my own perception of life, love, and art in general is difficult to understate. Its dreamlike composition and irresistible heart is rare, spellbinding, and brilliant. It's an optimistic, but never foolishly so, celebration of love and art - and beyond that, an argument that the two are inextricably linked. In the words of Sebastian, "It's conflict, and it's compromise, and it's very, very exciting."

La La Land revives the musical genre for the 21st century, and, following Whiplash, places Damien Chazelle among the best filmmakers working today. It's a perfect holiday film, and an unmitigated, non-sarcastic delight to a degree incredibly uncommon in modern cinema. I love this movie. Please, please see it.

Grade: A+