Infamous Hollywood Musical On Netflix Hasn’t Held Up

Starring Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone, La La Land is a musical about two people pursuing artistic dreams in L.A. who fall in love. After multiple chance encounters, aspiring actress Mia and disgruntled jazz musician Seb fall into a whirlwind romance that revolves around sharing their artistic passions.

The ups and downs of their careers that initially bring them together eventually push them apart. 

La La Land is a visual masterpiece with amazing sets, a distinct visual style, and fascinating camera work. Director Damien Chazellle’s work is immaculate, keeping an almost unnerving amount of visual attention on the two leads and making the most of every shot.

Its big musical numbers feature amazing effects and a dynamic camera that dances around as much as the actors. 

The focus on jazz also helps La La Land’s music stand out. Its long instrumental pieces are particularly moving and stand out as a bold choice in a musical, avoiding the temptation to rely on plot songs.

Of course, its jazz plot was also a major source of controversy, with critics pointing out that Seb is a white man single-handedly saving a traditionally black art form. 

While Chaelle’s directing is great his screenplay is incredibly bland, with a plot that feels excessively old-fashioned. Every moment in La La Land follows predictable beats, feeling so cliche they border on self-parody in moments like Seb missing Mia’s one-woman show and arriving as she leaves the theater in tears.

The movie fails to make up for its boring plot with deep characters or interesting dialogue. 

Seb and Mia are the only real characters in La La Land and they’re both completely one-note. Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling occasionally manage to give their characters some charisma, but Seb’s only personality trait is an obsession with traditional jazz and Mia’s only characteristic is her love for Hollywood.

They never feel real or interesting, making it impossible for me to care about their relationship. 

The dialogue in La La Land is also painfully cliche and filled with jokes that don’t land. Lines like “You say romantic like it’s a bad word,” stand out as too on the nose and unoriginal, feeling half-baked rather than purposefully direct.

The humor is equally generic, relying on bits like several people at a party driving Priuss with no further wit or comedy beyond that basic observation. 

From a technical standpoint, La La Land is a masterpiece, but the poor writing strips it of any emotional depth or heart. It doesn’t matter how beautiful a shot is if I don’t care about the boring characters in those shots.

The movie’s wonderful music can’t save it from the hacky jokes and dialogue with no personality in between those songs. 

GFR SCORE

A theatrical viewing might help the sheer spectacle of La La Land overshadow its flaws, but watching the movie on Netflix today the bad writing is impossible to ignore. While I could appreciate the movie’s visual style intellectually, it’s a movie about big emotions that I couldn’t engage with emotionally. Years removed from all the controversy and hype, I just find the film boring and soulless.