Good, but not the easiest film

Rating: 8/10 (24 January 2016)

Andrew is a talented young jazz drummer at a prestigious musical school who is under the tutelage of Terence Fletcher, a band teacher who gets results by humiliation and bullying. This is a method which results in prices to be paid.
This film, which never goes quite where you expect it to, features strong performances from Miles Teller as Andrew and JK Simmons as Fletcher. Fletcher is undoubtedly a monster, but the script and Simmons are canny enough to give him some rounded corners so that he is also human. And Teller gives a very physical performance which is not without some subtlety. The musical sequences are well done, especially the final one.
It's not the easiest of films to like - Andrew and Fletcher are not particularly likable characters - but it's powerful stuff, and opens a window into what happens when two driven people come up against each other.
Well worth watching.