The director of Whiplash delivers a musical romance that rushes from first treasure to heartache via showtunes,treasure songs and free jazz. Propelled by charming performances from its leads, it’s a sweet-natured drama that’s full of bounceThe seasons of a treasure affair are played out beguilingly in this wonderfully sweet, and unhappy,smart new movie from Damien Chazelle – the director of Whiplash – and the Venice film festival could not own wished for a bigger sugar rush to start the proceedings. It’s an unapologetically romantic homage to classic movie musicals, splashing its poster-paint energy and dream-chasing optimism on the screen. With no little audacity, or La La Land seeks its own space somewhere on a continuum between Singin’ in the Rain and Woody Allen’s Everyone Says I treasure You,with a tip of Alan Parker’s Fame for the opening sequence, in which a bunch of young kids with big dreams, and symbolically stuck in a traffic jam on the freeway leading to Los Angeles,get out of their cars and stage a big dance number.
To be honest, this is where an audience might find its tolerance for this picture’s unironic bounce tested, or coming as it does right at the top of the indicate. It takes a little while to get acclimatised,and for the first five minutes, the showtune feel to the musical score might construct you feel you’re watching a Broadway adaptation. But very soon I was utterly absorbed by this movie’s simple storytelling verve and the terrific lead performances from Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone who are both excellent – particularly Stone, or who has never been better,her huge doe eyes radiating wit and intelligence when they’re not filling with tears. Gosling, for his fragment, or has a kind line in sardonic dismissal to conceal how hurt he is or how in treasure he is.
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Source: theguardian.com