Romantic. Funny. Emotional. Beautiful.
A few nights ago I finally sat down and watched La La Land at the cinema and I’ve been obsessed with it ever since.
***This post may contain spoilers***
I’ve not felt this compelled to write about a film for a very long time. Maybe ever. I’m also glad I opted to see it at the Screening Rooms, partly due to the fact that there were less people around to see/hear me sob and the extra leg room let me easily jump up at the end and escape to the bathroom where I could fix my makeup. I cried. Actually cried. I cried with joy, laughter and sadness – my emotions were all over the place. I think the last time I cried at the cinema was when I watched Bridget Jones’ Baby last September (my first Screening Rooms experience), mainly due to the fact that I’ve been a fan for over 15 years and I was just so happy that our Bridge is back! From talking to friends about it, it seems that I wasn’t the only emotional wreck watching La La Land – but let’s start at the beginning, shall we?
The opening sequence was super upbeat and cheesy, and I loved every second of it! The “oh look, I’m in my car stuck in LA traffic, so I’ll just put on the radio and sing along before getting out of my car to dance with all the other impatient drivers” flash mob style number to Another Day of Sun made me dance in my seat. I’m pretty sure even the older gentleman sat next to me was tapping his feet along to the music. The musical number filled me with so much joy that I felt myself starting to well up with happy tears towards the end of the scene – it’s just so good! I wasn’t prepared for just how emotional it was going to get.
I hadn’t listened to the whole soundtrack before seeing the film because I wanted to experience the music within the scenes for the first time, but I’d already been won over by the songs I had heard. One of my favourite parts of the movie is where we see Mia (Emma Stone – what a babe) and her friends sing and dance to Someone In The Crowd – what an absolute tune!! The next time I’m out with the girls I’m definitely going to rock a colourful dress and shimmy down the street waving my skirt about… You know it’s going to be a great film when it makes you physically want to get up and dance, and your face hurts from smiling so much! It’s an uplifting escape from the bad stuff going on in the world at the moment, and we all need that from time to time. I’ve been reliving the film through the soundtrack ever since, I’ve even bought the CD to blast out in the car. Totally, utterly obsessed.
Okay, let’s talk about Ryan Gosling for a second. I’ve never been a huge fan, I’m not sure why, but it only took half an hour into La La Land for that to change. I’m unsure whether it was just his character Sebastian that I fell in love with, or maybe now I’ll become one of those girls who will Google his name and make his face my iPhone wallpaper – time will tell, I suppose. I still can’t quite believe that he actually learnt to play piano for the role! Those hands during the Jazz scenes are his actual hands, absolutely incredible. Not just a pretty face. I laughed so hard during the scene where he’s on a photoshoot with the band and he’s asked to bite his lip. Someone’s got to make that into a GIF, surely?!
From laughing out loud, to shedding a few tears during the next scene where Mia is doing her one-woman show and Sebastian fails to show up. One part of me felt sorry for her, yet I also felt bad for Sebastian – he’s caught in the middle of following his dreams that pays peanuts and being paid a lot of money to play music that he doesn’t necessarily like – poor chap. The film puts you on a real roller-coaster of emotions – one minute you’re cackling with laughter and the next thing you’re frantically trying to grab a tissue from your bag to catch the tears. You feel Mia’s pain after the show when she contemplates quitting her dream, and you feel Sebastian’s passion for wanting to play music and own his club. It’s relatable and that’s probably why I loved it so much. Most of us have (or have had) dreams that we hope to make a reality, and ultimately all have some sacrifices to make in order to reach them. I’m a big believer in not giving up, nor letting anyone influence you to do so, which is probably why I cried during Mia’s casting Audition, where she talks about her Aunt living in Paris and goes into song… She wanted that role so much and went through so much crap to get to that point – inside I was shouting ‘YOU GO GIRL! DON’T YOU DARE GIVE UP!’
You go along with them on their journey to fulfill their dreams, as they fall in love and fall apart. It’s not the ‘happy, cheesy’ musical that we initially see at the start of the movie, despite there being a few more uplifting numbers, there are also some beautiful slow songs in between. City of Stars and the Engagement Party track both fill me with a combination of hope and sadness. And that ending? I cried A LOT. I have so many questions about what happened, but I didn’t hate it. I get why it happened. Maybe you can’t have it all? It makes you re-evaluate exactly what you’re actually striving for – is it the ‘dream job’ or is it something else? SO MANY QUESTIONS!
Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling are truly phenomenal in this movie and I really hope La La Land takes home at least two or three Oscars – for the soundtrack, the performance and the cinematography. Now, I’m off to listen to the soundtrack for the hundredth time…
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