The best Oscar winning movie no one saw coming.

Rating: 10/10 (3 March 2015)

What can I say, this film got a lot elements very right. It's musically dynamic and puts emphasis on how far people are willing to travel down the rabbit hole to achieve GREATNESS.
It is a powerful process when one is inspiring greatness in another or having it pulled from within them by someone else. Especially when the driving force on both sides of this equation is rooted in a, "WHATEVER IT TAKES" mentality. And at the end of this process you are rewarded with something very, very special. This is the dualism of what "WHIPLASH" gives us.
Fletcher's (J.K. Simmons) use of unconventional practices and gritty, unbridled approaches as an instructor with expectations of absolute perfection. Coupled with Andrew's (Miles Teller) fierce and unquenchable desire to produce said perfection at all costs, is very nicely displayed here.
Both Simmons and Teller deliver the goods as we take this journey into what seems to be a very over the top aggression to performing exceptional jazz music. As a student, Andrew lives, eats, breaths and sleeps drumming to the point of self mutilation. His desire to be, "THE BEST" is superior to all else in his world. His only obstacle is the limitations in himself and the opposition his instructor, Fletcher, offers up in abundance. While Fletcher, the instructor/conductor is a perfectionist to the degree of being a narcissistic A-Hole. Deep down he wants the best out of the students who he deems worthy enough to be a part of his musical world.
As the two entangle into this love hate relationship. Andrew begins a destructive evolution as a person and an aspiring musician. Taking blow after blow; with some self inflicted and others delved out by Fletcher himself. Andrew begins to detach from the world around him as he fights to become relevant in the eyes of his instructor. While Fletcher seems to want to break Andrew's will to achieve greatness to the point of involving others at his disposal to generate as many devices as possible to push his limits to the brink.
Eventually the culmination of events crescendos to where both Andrew and Fletcher are brought back to reality. Each of them suffering a life altering aftermath to their destructive ways. They fatefully meet again some time after and all the blood, sweat, tears and tension laid out between them up to this point, lays the grounds for the MOTHER OF ALL BATTLES to ensue.
Fletcher and Andrew collide in front of the world as they take the stage. Fletcher takes his shot to put Andrew on his knees for good only Andrew doesn't go down so easily. Hes cut form the same cloth as his instructor and the two reach deadlock. Their commonality is what wins in the end as we are subjected to the sweet spoils of their war.
The ending result is a furious delivery of jaw dropping AWE. As the student becomes the master, we get exactly what they both have always wanted...absolute perfection.