Dazzling

Rating: 8/10 (5 January 2017)

An original Hollywood musical shot in Cinemascope and BRIGHT Tehnicolor. Sebastian (Ryan Gosling) a failed jazz musician and Mia (Emma Stone) s failed actress meet cute and fall in love. It follows their relationship over the course of a year. It all leads to a happy if bittersweet ending that literally had me sobbing in my seat.
The film looks gorgeous, the original score is great and the songs and dances are performed very energetically by the cast. It looks just like a 1950s Hollywood musical right down to the cars and clothes. There's also plenty of references to the old musicals sprinkled throughout. However this just misses the mark of being a great musical for one thing--I didn't really like the two main characters. Sebastian is a bit of a jerk and very arrogant. He's always talking about jazz which gets annoying. Mia is sweet but always seems depressed and dour all the time. I'm not blaming the actors--I blame the script. The acting is great but the characters aren't. I never warmed to them at all. Still all was forgiven during the last 10 minutes which, as I said, had me crying out loud. Also the individual music numbers throughout the picture are GREAT! So it's a VERY good musical that I recommend. Just bring plenty of tissues for the end.