I kept thinking that this is very similar to Cabin in the Woods.
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I kept thinking that this is very similar to Cabin in the Woods.
lol
I don't get it.
Well, you see, old boy, the image presented is that of an audition scene taken from a gory horror movie, accompanied here by a text from a song number staged during a similarly framed audition scene from a romantic musical film, thus producing the effect of internet humor through the juxtaposition of two disparate genres.
The tweeter in question also fairly disliked La La Land, so I am amused by the glibness of dismissing "Audition" in favor of this Audition (and courtesy of Aloha, this also feeds bit into "Emma Stone is Asian" meme that was very frequent for a while). Now that I typed all that I just realize this is maybe a bit too Film Twitter thing.
Really wanted to love this, but man, Spinal is right. This made just think of better movies it borrowed from. After the opening number, the movie was almost afraid to be a full-blown musical. Outside of the wonderful dance to the LA sunrise, there really isn't any memorable choreography in this film. Anyone who has seen a Hollywood musical from the 60's can guess this movie's outcome a mile away. I don't dislike it and I can see why young people are gobbling it up. It's rare to have a modern Hollywood musical not based on a Broadway play, but there's better movies about music and Hollywood out there (see Sing Street and Hail Caesar!)
Also, this is some weak ass love letter to LA. I feel like Chazelle is showing what most people think LA is about (traffic! gluten-free! horrible bosses! anal casting directors!)
This was a Coca Cola commercial version of a classic musical.
I keep trying to write another post that elaborates on this, but there's really nothing more to it than that. This endeared itself to my familiarity of Hollywood musicals and French musicals (which I actually think is the bigger influence here) almost the exact same way CITW played with horror.
Really disliked the opening two musical numbers. Why was the freeway dance number shot so tightly? What should have been a big, sunny, open scene felt cramped.
Also strongly disliked the ending. []
Mildly disliked how it avoided showing us any of Stone's character's work, whether the one-woman play or her big successes.
Really liked everything else. It's light, colorful, airy and endearing. It's a great ode to romance and the Hollywood dream. The flights of fancy were delightful---the silhouetted dance across the stars, the montage of their lives that could have been[]---and Gosling and Stone were very charming.
(Context: I came to this as someone with no affection for classical musicals. Except those by Busby Berkely.)
As a direct follow-up to my post on the effectiveness of music in movies (found here, in case you missed it), I take a look at the effectiveness of the music in La La Land, pretty much going down the line and breaking down in-depth why each piece of music in La La Land is absolutely brilliant in its inclusion and execution, and what it all brings to the full package as a whole for the film, for those who might be interested. ;) http://cwiddop.blogspot.com/2017/02/...a-la-land.html
This is playing in IMAX this week, so I took the opportunity to see it again. :cool:
Once is more than enough for a lifetime :)
I really didn't like this. I felt it would have been better if it had taken place in the 80s. I feel like characters should I always play to the height of their intelligence and if you have a smart phone which they clearly gave you at the beginning, made sure to show it was cracked. Why can't they search the internet? How bad of a relationship is it if while at dinner the guy runs into john legend and they're awkward. He says he's an old musician he used to know. But suddenly he's playing with him and the movie even shows them doing interviews on youtube and then the girlfriend sees him playing synths for the first time at the concert? Seriously? Never at any point did she in this whole time look on youtube? Even though the movie showed us youtube she just didn't look up the person her boyfriend was working with and they never had a conversation about this stuff? Of course they're going to have a break up fight, they clearly don't talk in the first place.
"Will you come to Boise with me?"
"No, but you know what we could do since we have smart phones, we could Skype! Whoa, problem solved. No need to have our fight we're destined to have."
Then there's the what if ending. So you mean to tell me, if he had kissed her in the bar after getting fired, a girl he's never met except flipped her off earlier that morning than he would not only fulfill his dream of being a bar owner but also her dreams and they'd live happily ever after! Of course! Kiss random women!
I love musicals. This musical made me mad.
The ending really is manipulative and hollow. In reality, Gosling owns a club and Stone is famous, so the only things that her self-indulgent reinvention really changes is that (a) Gosling defaults to her opinion about what is valid artistic expression (i.e., he doesn't play in a band that uses synths [OMG!]) and (b) everyone recognizes her genius from the start, rather than later.
Such bullshit.
I don't get your criticism. The fact that the fantasy doesn't change the career trajectory was the point. The fantasy is strictly about their romance, which was implied to be the sacrifice they made so they could achieve those dreams that they were previously compromising in order to be a good romantic partner. The reason I found it incredibly moving was because they both acknowledged their respective real life happiness that they achieved through selfishness, but shared that brief moment fantasizing movie happiness where things are easier and what they wanted for themselves isn't in conflict with what they wanted for each other.
(a) it wasn't a shared fantasy at the end, it was hers alone
(b) the actual romance that is mythologized amounts to basically 5 minutes of montage in the middle of a series of meet cutes and some atrociously conceived conflicts
(c) the movie shies away from what that sacrifice actually was with the "Five years later" convenience. She had to sacrifice the relationship so she could sleep with someone in Paris? He had to sacrifice the relationship because synthesizers don't play themselves? Or did the romance just naturally fizzle because that's what they do sometimes? Who knows, because Chazelle wants to have his cake and eat it too; it's important to keep the characters spotless in order for the forced ending to work.
Gosling and Stone are charming as fuck. Gosling, once again in 2016, proves he has excellent comedic timing. And Stone is just an overall great actress. However, the dance numbers DO NOT hold up with other musicals. In fact, this was barely a musical. More apt description is: a film with music. The Gosling/Stone tap dance duo was a little sad. I realize it's 2016, and Hollywood is focused primarily on super heroes, but you cannot force new dogs to do old trickss. That being said, the story is absolutely fine. It's fun. It's simple. It's sad! The opening one shot is perfection with direction. The music was a let down.
I want this to win best picture. I haven't felt this joyful and exuberant after seeing a movie since I don't remember fucking when!!
This doesn't deserve best picture.