This past Sunday evening, La La Land hosted the Golden
Globes. And the Golden Globes ceremony, sponsored by the Hollywood Foreign
Press corps, returned the favor by making a big winner out of Damien Chazelle’s
Hollywood musical, La La Land. Well
before the envelopes were opened, it was clear that La La Land was high on everyone’s list. Even the opening of the TV
broadcast saluted Chazelle’s work by mimicking the film’s famous Hollywood
traffic jam, with M.C. Jimmy Fallon among those caught up in the musical
action.
Personally, I’d been waiting to see La La Land for a long time. As a native Angeleno (born in
Hollywood, yet!) as well as a huge fan of movie musicals, I was eager to watch
a paean to my birthplace, sung and danced by talented young performers. And
Chazelle’s Whiplash was such a
genuinely thrilling piece of work that I had the highest hopes. I’d heard
Chazelle speak beautifully about the raison d’être for movie musicals: the way
they capture emotion through fantasy; the way they sidestep conventional movie
realism with a boldness that’s positively avant-garde. Chazelle’s favorites were
my favorites too: Fred and Ginger, Singin’
in the Rain, The Umbrellas of
Cherbourg. So, yes, I was excited.
When I finally went to see La La Land, I was accompanied by two family members. One of them is
(fingers crossed) starting to make a name for himself as a writer of stage
musicals. We all expected to be bowled over. And there was a lot to like.
F’rintance, that exuberant opening on an L.A. freeway when commuters give up on
getting where they’re going, instead bounding out of their cars to sing and
dance to “Another Day of Sun.” And the in-jokes that capture the spirit (if not
exactly the reality) of my home town: everyone drives a Prius; despite the
season the weather never quite changes. And the bold colors all the women are
wearing. And the romantic use made of one of my favorite places, the Griffith
Park Observatory. And an astonishing final “dream ballet” sequence à la An American in Paris. And my personal
favorite little scene, when a star-crossed Ryan Gosling -- serenading sunset on
the Hermosa Beach pier -- sweeps a very average middle-aged lady into a waltz
as her spouse looks on, bemused.
So why the “yes, but”? I realized, while watching the film,
that the central story line just wasn’t quite enough to hold me. The tale of
Mia and Sebastian -- she a would-be actress, he a jazz pianist too pure to stray
into other musical styles – left me a bit cold. I was less bothered that Emma
Stone and Ryan Gosling don’t come off as trained singers and dancers. After
all, both possess oodles of charm. But their on-again, off-again romance didn’t
seem entirely worth rooting for. Not that all musicals are blessed with great screenplays.
I know one of Chazelle’s big influences (and the source of that opening musical
outburst) was Jacques Demy’s Les
Demoiselles de Rochefort, a very charming, very French musical in which all
the romantic comings and goings finally amount to very little. Still I, and my
two moviegoing companions, felt just a bit cheated by La La Land’s script deficiencies.
And yet . . . as I hear snippets
of those musical numbers, like the lovely “City of Stars,” I start remembering
all the parts of La La Land that gave
me pleasure. And made me – come to think of it – want to jump on top of my
Lexus and start dancing. Who could ask for anything more?
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