Writer/director Damien Chazelle has already brought us the highly entertaining surprise hit of last year’s Oscar season in Whiplash, and he is sure to be back on the red carpet this year with his most recent follow up. It’s clear that he too has a flare for the dramatic as he, for whatever reason, decided to make a love story between two artistic hopefuls into a musical. I say this because looking back, the singing and dancing really didn’t add that much to the story (I have my goofy friend to thank for pointing this out to me). Don’t get me wrong, there was definitely a scene or two that added some wonderful magic to this rather engaging story via the show tunes Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone provided us; but overall, this film was pretty solid without it.
This is the third time Gosling and Stone have paired up and brought us their unique chemistry on film. Both in real life and on camera they seem like such an odd couple but for whatever reason when the lights come on, it just seems to work. Gosling is his usual casually funny slash borderline jerk self, while Stone brings her typical sassiness with a hint of innocence to the story.
Her character Mia is an aspiring actress who keeps trying to live out her dream even though she continues to get rejected at every turn. And in between auditions, she spends most of her time either working at a coffee shop on a studio lot or trying desperately to avoid the usual awful LA party scene. Gosling’s character Sebastian, is a traditional jazz piano player who has dreams of opening his own club one day so he can share with the world what made jazz such a wonderful genre back during its inception. Both of them have essentially gone all in to reach their goals and that includes living with three other people or tossing aside past due bills with regularity. And I have to say that It truly is inspirational to see someone absolutely throw caution to the wind when chasing their dreams, even if their loved ones can’t understand why they do it.
Well naturally when these two eventually meet, they’re instantly going to fall in love, right? Wrong! Every time they randomly run into each other, Gosling is the ultimate jerk to Stone. Now some of it is due to poor timing and some of it is due to Sebastian’s blind passion for his craft. But things finally do take off when Mia runs into him and his awesome (I use that term loosely) 80’s cover band at a pool party. And from that point on, the singing and dancing goes to another level.
Oh, but don’t you worry, there was definitely plenty of that before this scene. The opening credits almost had me walk out of the theater because it was just a little too over the top, even for me. It was like the Sound of Music meets LA traffic; which looking back on it, sounds really fresh!
But that scene served as an appetizer for what was to come later, a two hour celebration of one of the greatest cities on Earth. LA is a city where you can chase whatever dream you have and in the process fall in love with a kindred spirit. There are beautiful sights everywhere, whether you’re up in the hills or the mountains or you’re standing under one of its many landmarks; it’s nearly impossible to be bored there. And this is why I loved this film so much. If I could sing and dance in the streets and get away with it whenever I’m there, I would totally do it. And maybe this is why I was caught singing and dancing on top of park benches while twirling my goofy and mortified friend outside of the theater once the film ended; I wanted to be there at that moment so I too could talk passionately about music or film as if they were the only things that mattered!
But this is something Hollywood must be aware of when pushing this film come Oscar season; unless you are an art nerd or you are direct descendant of a middle to upper middle class family, chances are this film will be lost on you. I by no means would ever recommend La La Land to Jethro in Renaw, Alabama or to Tasha in Compton. But even taking all of that into account, I must give this film rating of very FRESH!
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