Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone as Sebastian and Mia in La La Land
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La La Land - Film Review
Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone as Sebastian and Mia in La La Land |
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La La Land
is about dreamers and dreams. It is also about falling in love, falling
in love with your dreams and falling in love with someone, but not just
anyone, someone who encourages you and supports you in the pursuit of
your dreams. It is about knowing that realizing your dreams comes at a
cost both personally and financially.
Winner of the People’s Choice Award at the Toronto International Film
Festival, La La Land, written
and directed by Damien Chazelle and with spectacular performances by
Ryan Gosling (as Sebastian) and Emma Stone (as Mia), brings back the
charm of classic Hollywood musicals, while adhering to a good storyline.
Damien Chazelle says, “With La La
Land I wanted to explore how you balance life with art and how you
balance dreams and reality,” and he goes on to say, “I wanted to use
music and dance to express it. The movie is about passion for art and
passion for love. It is about using dreams and using fantasy to comment
on reality.”
Sebastian is a Jazz pianist and singer / composer and Mia is a
struggling actress. Sebastian is playing in a restaurant where nobody
seems to be listening and Mia is a barista with a stack of audition
rejections that are piling up. They keep bumping into each other despite
themselves and yes they fall in love.
We will paraphrase a line from the film, but remember it. Sebastian
tells Mia that he wants to take her to see a film, “strictly for
research purposes.”
The doubts that creep into an artist’s life especially with the emotional
rollercoaster of emotional highs and crushing rejections is depicted in
the characters taking turns to push one another to keep pursuing their
own dreams.
Gosling talks about his character Sebastian, “It is easier for him to
get onboard with Mia’s dream than it is for him to get onboard with his
own, to do what she loves to do.”
The film is romantic, dramatic and has just the right touch of humor to
add some levity, but not so much that the film becomes comedic.
If you are a fan of classic films featuring dance numbers by
people such as Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, do not get
caught up with comparisons, just enjoy the dancing of Gosling and Stone for
what it is, beautiful. Kudos to choreographer Mandy Moore, for her work
with not just Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone, but the numerous other
dancers throughout this film that will have you acting like a child in a
candy shop saying I want more of this and a little bit more of that.
From the opening scene, which features an eye-popping and colorful song
and dance number, this movie will have you sitting on the edge of your
seat.
Choreographer Mandy Moore says, “In order for an audience to be vested
in something they have to have a feeling of being connected with it and
that they are real people moving and then it just transcends and moves
into this fantasy world. That
was number one with Damien and me, finding out what that bridge would
be. How do we go from Ryan and
Emma being normal people in a musical, but very real actors, brilliant
actors and what is that segue and that bridge into dance. Then when it
becomes dance how does it stay accessible to people. When you put two
people in a room and you ask them to dance, the vulnerability and the
journey that happens with that you can’t teach it. It just is. You get
in the room and you learn so much about each other. You open up. Dance
does that. I knew by getting them (Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone) in a
room and having them for months at a time we would get there. If I had
only had them for a week I would be really worried about that.”
One of the highlights of the film is the Griffith Park dance scene with
Sebastian and Mia and Emma Stone talks about that, “It was done in one
take and it is when our characters really connect for the first time.”
Chazelle enlisted the help of university classmate and composer Justin
Hurwitz for the musical score. The theme song “City of Stars,” was
composed by Hurwitz and the lyricists are Benj Pasek and Justin Paul.
The words, “City of stars
are you shining just for me? City of stars you never shine so brightly,”
really does reflect what this outstanding film is all about. Jasper
Randall the choir and vocal contractor assembled some incredible talent
for La La Land and it was
supported by a fabulous ninety piece orchestra.
If you are looking for a fairytale type of movie this is not the one for
you. This is an excellent
script, in part, because it does not sugarcoat the challenges, the
heartbreaks and the feeling of ecstasy that accompany the pursuit of a
career in music or acting. The director and actors authentically capture
the emotional highs and lows that artists go through.
Although, the cast is large, in part due to the dance numbers, there
really are not any co-stars in La
La Land and that is just fine, because Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling
carry this movie. In fact, if we are pushed to name co-stars we would
say the music and dance numbers are the real co-stars.
If you can only fit one movie into a modest budget or a tight time
schedule we encourage you to make that film
La La Land.
Editor’s note:
Direct quotes were derived from studio interviews, courtesy of EPK.TV.
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