LaLa Review

Rating: 7/10 (28 September 2017)

The film, La la Land, is a story that is carried more by color and music than plot or characters. That is not to say that the plot or characters take away from the film. By nature, musicals tend to compromise character traits and logical scenes for visuals and song. People do not just randomly break into songs or dance to choreographed music. It is difficult to create a musical because the songs should further the plot, fit the characters and not feel too out of place. This film does a decent job of matching the character's songs to their personalities, but I believe that the focus of this movie lies with the colors. The colors in this movie are widely varied both in locations and outfits. Mia, the main character, wears several different dresses throughout the film. These dresses vary wildly in color and appearance. The purpose of the dresses appears to be mostly aesthetic, giving Mia an outfit that would compliment the rest of the scene and make her stand out. La la Land is a film that focuses heavily on aesthetics. These dresses are used in conjunction with several scenes where the lighting changes to emphasize a specific color. This is used to convey emotion as well as pull the viewer's attention to Mia and her actions during these scenes. Scenes with dramatic lighting like this often end up showing more emotional aspects of the story. As a musical, how a character moves and looks is incredibly meaningful to the story. Some of the most striking examples of the use of color include when Mia and Sebastian meet at the moment Sebastian is fired and when Mia and Sebastian argue over his dreams. There are also several scenes that use color together with a low lighting such as when Mia enters the bathroom, walks home, or sings for her recital. These scenes all take advantage of color to highlight both the characters and the atmosphere. Another aspect that this film takes advantage of is the movement of the characters and camera. It is not just the dancing that is eye catching, although that is one of the main uses of movement utilized by the film. When Mia and Sebastian first enter the observatory, the camera spins around displaying the room. This eventually leads to a dance in the star filled observatory itself where the characters appear to be dancing among the stars. I am sure that this is a reference to something, although I am not sure what. This film is very much a product of it's time. It is full of references to other movies, both through the parody of specific scenes and the characters directly mentioning other movies of the time. I believe that a portion of what endears this movie to people is the nostalgia of remembering great movies of the past. This is not inherently a bad thing, but younger members of the audience who may not remember such movies, will not be able to receive the full experience the film was designed to provide. The plot of this movie is relatively simple. The main characters fall in love and decide to follow their dreams, end up failing and break up only to seize the chance to follow their dreams again. One interesting feature of the film is that, while both characters are able to realize their dreams, these dreams cause them to part ways, effectively ending the romantic plot as they each go to live their own lives. There is a happy ending, but it can be seen that they compromised their relationship for the sake of their dreams. It is possible that they could have made everything work out 'perfectly', but I think such an ending would be much less satisfactory and that their ability to each pursue their own dream to fruition is what makes them such likable characters.