Saw it tonight with the girlfriend. We both loved it. The music and visuals are, of course, stunning. But the performances are what make this thing go - Stone especially.

The film I'll be rooting for during the awards circuit.

"What a Waste of a Lovely Night" was so much fun to watch and see Stone and Gosling play off each other with the choreography.

The film's tension between love and dreams hit me harder than I thought it would.

Great flick!

I really wanted to love this movie. I love musicals and this looked really great in the trailers. I felt like this movie was going to be tailor made for me to love, but it just didn't come together for me.

The musical numbers just didn't land for me; if you're marketing a musical it needs memorable musical numbers and songs. I didn't mind the amateur-singing because that had its charm, but the numbers built and never paid off. And the sound seemed really soft in the opening number. I think if I hadn't been expecting a real musical it might have landed better for me.

It seemed very "Hollywood celebrates Hollywood" at times - look how tough it is to audition, just keep at it, don't sell out! It reminded me of Shakespeare in Love in that way. There were scenes I watched where I thought "oh actors are totally going to laugh at this at another inside joke level and vote for this". I don't totally mind that but for some reason it felt very obvious.

On the plus side, Emma stone was fantastic. She is truly special on screen. The movie was beautiful to look at and the final "what if" scene was absolutely lovely and touching.

Just saw it. Wife liked it, but I agree with the above. It's a Hollywood movie for LA people.

Much better that Birdman though!

Perhaps. But, honestly, I loathe chick flicks.

Man I just came away from the movie thinking, "Texags likes this?" The thread makes it sound like it is the best thing since sliced bread, which it isn't. Its a nice little romance with some dancing and color. But I don't think I would go out of my way recommending it like this thread.

What sucks about movies is that everyone has to have the same reaction. We can't like them for personal reasons or have different experiences when watching them.

I use gay to mean gay as in homosexual. Thats about it.

I tend to tell people that it's not really a bombastic musical with lots of dance numbers, beyond the intro sequence (which was strangely quiet at our theater too).

rhutton125 said:

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I tend to tell people that it's not really a bombastic musical with lots of dance numbers, beyond the intro sequence (which was strangely quiet at our theater too).

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I'd agree, much more like a traditional Hollywood musical where they use song to exhibit extreme emotions.
I thought the sound on the first number was just my ears the morning after a loud New Year's Eve party, weird everyone is having problems with it.

and the opening scene was probably one of my least favorite scenes.

Same here.

The opening scene was pointless to me other than showing the main characters. Starting right off with a song without any establishment was the wrong note imo.

There was actually a cut of the movie that didn't have it at one point. The first musical scene was the one at Stone's character's apartment with her roommates. But they finally decided to put it back in.

I liked the opening scene a LOT - the continuous motion of the camera and the energy were great, but the sound was so low on the voices it didn't land as the "big opening number" it was trying to be (or trying to tribute). That song and the girls getting ready song really set it up to be a musical, but the music tapered off as the movie progressed.

Nope. I wasn't in the mood yet. I was just distracted by the cars double wide on a single lane freeway ramp.

Saw it tonight and really enjoyed it. Probably in my top 3 of 2016. Stone and Gosling have some amazing on-screen chemistry together. When the first scene was all music I was a little hesitant on whether or not I was going to like it. But it certainly wasn't nearly the 'musical' I thought it would be. I thought it balanced the music perfectly. The end scene was a gut punch, but I loved it.

All in all, I thought it was good. The acting, cinematography, and directing are all fantastic; however, the story really drags at certain points and there was a guy near me who was snoring. This movie was like cinematic cocaine, really good highs followed by gut wrenching lows. It doesn't have that "woah" moment that some other good films had this year, but if you aren't sure if you're red-green colorblind, then this film is for you. I'd put it behind HoHW, Arrival, Nocturnal Animals, & Hacksaw Ridge at this point (I've yet to see Manchester by the Sea), but it's definitely worthy of a Best Picture nom and should easily win the Cinematography category.

Edit: To echo the thoughts of some on the thread, that opening scene was very WTF. It's like something out of an acid trip.

schmendeler said:

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The opening scene was pointless to me other than showing the main characters. Starting right off with a song without any establishment was the wrong note imo.

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Scenes like that are Musicals 101; the overture establishes a lot of the movie's core music. Personally I liked that they went big and colorful and got your foot tapping immediately.

Inspector Spacetime said:

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schmendeler said:

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The opening scene was pointless to me other than showing the main characters. Starting right off with a song without any establishment was the wrong note imo.

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Scenes like that are Musicals 101; the overture establishes a lot of the movie's core music. Personally I liked that they went big and colorful and got your foot tapping immediately.

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the problem was I had no interest in these random people in traffic. I kind of just sat there waiting for the characters to show up.

Fantastic movie. Loved every second of it, and while I haven't seen Moonlight, I expect this to win best picture and deservedly so.

Man Damian Chazelle absolutely owns the art of the final climax. It is unbelievable how talented this guy is and even more so for his age... We're looking at the next Scorsese right here.


edit: One cool thing, I was in L.A. a few months ago and spent an afternoon at the Griffith Observatory and Park. It was cool seeing the scenes inside of it having just been there and standing where they were... I'm also damn near positive I sat on that exact same bench they did.

Great to hear! Ha, in my initial reaction, I literally thought about saying something along the lines of "Chazelle could very well be the next Spielberg," but I figured I'd get sh*t for it. The Scorsese comparison is much more apt, though. In ten years, I really do think he'll be one of the top three working directors - just one of those guys where it's a big deal whenever he has a movie coming out.

That's funny, I was texting my buddy right when I got out and was writing, "This kid is the next Speilberg" but I stopped, thought about it, and went with Scorsese instead... Just seems like he identifies more in that vein, of more grounded but absolutely incredible movies... Although, I'd love to see him do a big budget blockbuster. Hell, I'll see anything he chooses to do.

Right there with you though, it's going to be a huge deal when he has a movie come out.

While solid, to me at least, this is the film equivalent of Dave Matthews Band. It's "look how awesome and artsy I am while I do artsy crap for the sake of being artsy".

i finally had a chance to see this last night and i havent enjoyed a movie like that in quite some time. Gosling and Stone were absolute gold.

Sex Panther said:

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BassCowboy33 said:

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While solid, to me at least, this is the film equivalent of Dave Matthews Band. It's "look how awesome and artsy I am while I do artsy crap for the sake of being artsy".

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This is one of the worst analogies I've ever seen

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I'll try to do better next time.

So, this is pretty long, but if you want to watch an argument (well multiple arguments) about if this movie is good or not, this week's Screen Junkies Movie Fight gets pretty crazy. I've been watching Honest Trailers from SJ for a couple years now but discovered Movie Fights a few years ago and absolutely love it.

Oops, SP beat me to it.

ATM1876 said:

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I like Honest Trailers for a good laugh so I watched a little bit of this. For those who are interested, the discussions of La La Land that I found occur at 8:15 (the epilogue for best scene), 22:30 (Stone for best performance) and 35:05 (most overrated film of 2016). That last segment is from somebody who admittedly had a completely different reaction than just about everybody else, but his critique seemed to veer into a political rant and ended with cursing at everybody else on the panel. I enjoy a healthy debate as much as anybody, but the tone of his discourse was enough for me to stop watching at that point. For what it's worth, he thought the best scene of any 2016 movie was in Batman v Superman, so he and I will have to agree to disagree on at least two points.

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He's a comic book writer (and has written some for Wonder Woman I believe), so seeing her on screen for the first time was a big deal for him, regardless of film quality.

I will say I know people with similar reactions to the last scene though. I understand the argument that the movie tries to cheat and has it both ways.

But yes to anyone else thinking of watching, be warned there is some language. All the people on the show are good friends but they can definitely go overboard during their arguments.