lol- definitely interested to hear your opinion on it, Ricky.
I'd love to man to but it's hard to do it briefly without coming off like I'm stamping my feet. And that will just make me sound contradictory for the sake of being so.
Of those, I sadly only saw The Manchurian Candidate. Loved that one though. Great movie.
First of all, I'm always shocked if I've seen anything you,
@europe1 or
@Bullitt68 haven't. So give me a moment...
And secondly, duuuuuuuuuuuude.... you need to see
Seven Days in May. I think
Bull recommended it to me.
Speaking of Kyle, he also recommended this incredible San Francisco thriller called
Experiment in Terror. Reminded me of the tone of
Seconds and
The Manchurian Candidate. Put those on a list for yourself. All great films.
But yeah, do
Seven Days in May first. Lancaster and Kirk Douglas bro, Frankenheimer at the helm. Can't go wrong.
Don't worry Imma come back at these bros in a bit and I'm recruiting
@shadow_priest_x for the task too.
I have no worries for my safety as long as you are by my side.
I'm down.
@Ricky13, La La Land's a great film.
It's a good film on a number of levels. I'm not trying to get into the actual worth of the film. I just don't find Chazelle is very good at making what looks great on screen mean anything on the page. (He had similar issues with
Whiplash.)
I'm not thrilled by how the film looks. I like LA more than the other major US cities I've visited. I like how it looks at night. I've been to most of the iconic places in the film. But he does a lot of it all wrong in terms of matching execution to intent. Or maybe he's not concerned with that marriage. He appears to put homage and technique before purpose of scene. Does that make sense?
Have you noticed how he insisted on using Cinemascope when Stone's face looks weird on it? Or how he holds on to shots without cutting for no reason other than it being pretty cool that he did (I actually thought this negatively impacted the first scene)?
Even that can be relegated to the wastebasket of personal preference. It's hard to argue and results in a lot of discussions that boil down to , "But I liked how it looked! Different strokes bro!"
But critically,
as a story, it falters, and is why it'll struggle to be "classic". That magic Hollywood feeling that it depends on doesn't last. Does anyone talk about
The Artist anymore?
The discussion you guys are having, though I haven't gone through it closely enough, is reflective of it. Musicals demand immersion at a profoundly unconscious level because the maker can't afford to let motivations be left to chance for fear of waking you up from the dream. There's no doubt who loves whom in
Singin' in the Rain, and who is happy and who is sad in the end. That clarity is what allows otherwise distracting musicality to seamlessly inhabit the conceit.
We should not be talking about whether the ending is sad, whether Stone's character is happy or Gosling's isn't. But we are because the foundations of those relationships weren't built functionally. The magic of the moment, its form, was lent precedence, over the nuts and bolts of difficult storytelling. Think carefully about why you and
@chickenluver are arguing about who is sad and who is happy and you'll find it's because the romance comes out of nowhere.
We can get into that but I've probably fucked up an entire meeting because of typing this much.
I imagine, when it's done right, the correct execution of the conception of a musical romance looks a little bit like this:
Note how it's one take for a
reason: she's watching him (her POV throughout, really) and closes in on him from being drawn to him, after which they have the cutest conversation ever that cuts right to his romantic state and her role as someone who helps him remember he's good at this (not in the clip).
Oh and the song is actually great, unlike that drivel Gosling sings in the bar. (Sorry, low blow.)
And there's a whole other conversation to be had about how Chazelle obsessively romanticises being a tragically struggling musician while all around are abandoning their principles (selling out). He does this in
Whiplash too. As opposed to embracing how the shit he's trying to talk about - love, life and relationships while trying to make it as a musician - is about the people you share the music making process with. Not your processes as an insular musical douchebag (like Gosling's character in
La La Land and that guy in
Whiplash with the hysterically punchable face).
Doing the insular musical douchebag thing is hard. Even the genius brothers Coen know that if you're going there, you need to link the individual's tragic state to loss, and guess who they choose that person to be in their study?
The one the insular musical douchebag used to make music with:
This insular artsy guy with "principles" is well-worn territory for the Coens. They've executed the kind of character study Chazelle aims at. The difference: the Coens know that these people exist not because everyone around them sucks.
It's because they're douchebags.
And they punish them spectacularly:
The only reason I could see for someone not liking it is if they just don't like musicals. Any musicals.
Got no issue with musicals.
Got an issue with bad ones though. Heh.
