Amazon.com: La La Land [Blu-ray + DVD + Digital HD] : Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, Damien Chazelle: Movies & TV (original) (raw)
Reviews with images
Damien Chazelle's love letter to the Hollywood Musical
La La Land can be best described as the surprise of the year; a completely original film musical amidst the crowd of CGI action and sci-fi fare that tends to have more bankable "pull." The story is simple; Mia (Emma Stone) a young, struggling Hollywood actress falls in love with Sebastian (Ryan Gosling), a young, struggling jazz pianist as they both weigh their relationship amidst their respective hopes and dreams. In typical musical fashion, the film is punctuated by show-stopping numbers, elaborate dance sequences, with arresting production design and cinematography to spare.The Blu-ray features a bright and colorful 2.55:1 true Cinemascope picture. I can only imagine what this must look like in 4K, but the 1080p picture still looked fantastic on my 4K screen. As with almost every modern film these days, detail and color quality were pristine. The picture gets it's best mileage during "Someone In The Crowd" when Mia and her friends are dancing in the street wearing bright-colored dresses, and the Griffith Observatory sequence.The sound is Dolby Atmos, and is appropriately bombastic for a musical of this caliber. From the opening sequence with the traffic horns filling in the rear channels to the nuance of every instrument, shoe-tap against the floor, or even background noise; everything comes through clear and tangible. Dialogue is also clear and intelligible.For a standard release, there is a healthy amount of extras that accompanies the disc. We get an audio commentary with writer/director Damien Chazelle and composer Justin Hurwitz. Over an hour of featurettes covering various aspects of production; my favorite being the highway sequence, which really makes you appreciate the amount of effort that went into shooting that scene. Damien and Justin Sing: The Demos are two rough demos of "What a Waste of a Lovely Night" and "City of Stars" by Chazelle and Hurwitz set to behind the scenes footage. Their voices are tolerable, but it's nice to hear what these songs were in their early form. There's a Marketing Gallery featuring three trailers and an interactive poster gallery, and a song selection which allows access to the film's individual song/dance numbers. Lastly, we get a DVD with the above features minus the featurettes and an UV digital copy.I enjoyed La La Land immensely; it's an easy recommendation if you enjoy musicals, either film or stage.
Thank you for your feedback
Sorry, there was an error
Sorry we couldn't load the review
- Sort by reviews type
Top reviews from the United States
There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.
Reviewed in the United States on June 3, 2017
I admittedly came into this film with low expectaions, prepared to suspend the vivid memories of musicals that have moved me; or the great exponents of the American popular song (Sarah, Ella, Billie, Sinatra); or the most soulful improvisers in jazz (Coltrane, Louis, Mobley, Bill Evans, Wyn Kelly). It was a tall order, trying to forget about Chaplin ("City Lights," "Modern Times"), Fred and Ginger ("Swing Time"),; Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron or Debbie Reynolds). "American in Paris" is my personal all-time fav, though I concede that "Singin' in the Rain" reigns as the greatest of all screen musicals.
Compared with any of the foregoing examples, I expected "La La Land" to be bright and gauzy, purely escapist "fluff"--and in one sense, it is. Anyone who believes that a struggling, mediocre jazz pianist (it takes one--i.e., this writer--to know one) would end up with his own jazz club ("Seb's Place"), which is unbelievably large and filled--is living in a dream world which this movie, in its best moments, "evokes" but does not lie about. Outdoor jazz festivals have long since replaced jazz clubs as the only lucrative venues for jazz artists--though the public's notion that there are still musicians who can "make a living" by playing jazz remains, in the 2nd decade of the 21st century, a myth of gigantic, even dangerous, proportions. (Successful jazz musicians secure MacArthur grants, guest professorships, UNESCO projects, conservatory teaching gigs, etc.--from which they can pick and choose when and where they play "out.")
The opportunities for actors let alone "song and dance" performers are almost as remote, especially when proportionality is factored in (there are only so many musicals for a seemingly infinite number of contestants). But despite its improbabilites, this movie won me over, for some of the following key reasons:
1. The two photographs in Seb's (Ryan Gosling's) pad are of John Coltrane and Bill Evans (I wonder what percentage of viewers recognized them). These two figures, I always felt, are the two most important, seminal musicians in the second half of jazz history. (The essential figures in the first half are more numerous: Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington,Count Basie, Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young, Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie.) But those two photographs--in combination with Seb's dismissal of the music of Kenny G (not jazz) and his learning from records (LP's, which is how my college friends and I learned how to play the music)--that was enough "realism" to bring a degree of seriousness to the story of Seb and Mia (Emma Stone). Additionally, there are numerous references to jazz as a dying art and as an old story that belongs in the previous century. In the face of such sad but undeniably true testimony, Seb's refusal to write the music's obituary ("Not on my watch!" he says) strikes us as believable. (I know quite a few musicians who believe as Seb.)
2. When Mia (Emma Stone) fails to show on time for Seb's offer of a date at the movies, she becomes distraught and runs to the movie theater (where Seb is conveniently seated, alone, closest to the screen). Emma walks unto the stage and, in effect, becomes part of the movie that Seb is watching. It's one of those magic moments in which the viewer suspends disbelief, a captive to Orson Welle's definition of the movies as "a ribbon of dreams." We realize we're watching a movie about movies--which is exactly the privileged position that "Singin' in the Rain" ( a movie about the evolution and essence of the movies) affords the viewer (admittedly, with greater, more enduring satisfaction).
3. The critical dance number in which we're allowed to see the connection between the two dreamers even before they themselves realize it is definitely not wasted in "La La Land." It occurs outside, above a parking lot overlooking Los Angeles' lights at night. True, it's not Astaire or Kelly (though it would be hard to fault either Gosling or Stone as singers--since their celebrated forebears were not especially notable for their singing voices). The scene manages to be at once spell-binding and compelling, thanks to the lighting, the mis en scene and, above all. a cooperative camera that refuses to relinquish its job to some editor. In a shot that is breath-taking in its duration (not a single cut!), the space is preserved between the pair, thanks to the third member of the dance team, which is necessarily the cooperative camera.
4. Seb's "submission" to John Legend's offer to play in his "futuristic" band (an electrified fusion-disco ensemble), was totally believable and familiar to this viewer. Watching Gosling standing up while holding down, with a single hand, the keys of a small electric piano (Keith Jarrett long ago dismissed all electrics as "toys"), I could only imagine how I looked as a week-end "keyboard player" doing the same (I went through four Fender Rhodes keyboards--one stolen from the band van--and that was before the Yamaha DX7 and digital keyboards replaced most analog keyboards).
So there's some believability about a musical that's set AFTER the age of jazz and the American musical (the source of most of the "jazz standards" comprising the "Great American Songbook"). Moreover, the aforementioned moments of realism come after the awakening number on the crowded Los Angeles freeway--four lanes of congested traffic all headed in the same direction! But instead of honking their horns during a major snarl-up, the occupants of each car escape from their mobile prison boxes and, like a rapidly spreading wildfire, burst out in song and dance! What a way to open a musical! Perhaps not in its most "classic" form but at least close enough to "Saturday Night Fever" and "Grease" to arrest and hold our attention.
The love story is as simple as they come--with one difference. Boy and girl don't end up with each other (except in their imaginations). Here the movie has an opportunity to score points about the invidious threat of the "American Dream Factory," which attracts, then chews up and spits out 99% of the aspirants who allow themselves to become bewitched in the gauzy fantasy of "La La Land." Instead it allows us to fantasize that Seb and Mia are forced, merely, to settle on a consolation prize. They don't end up with each other, but each makes a choice that's close enough to their original dreams. As a result, they're finally left with some semblance of the over-taught and over-read Robert Frost poem, "The Road Not Taken" (Oh, how things might have been different. Oh, if only life didn't offer us such choices. Maybe we should seek citizenship in N. Korea.)
Give the director points for using, in place of digital cameras, genuine film. (It works in subconscious ways to make the viewer a privileged member of a 1950s audience.) And Emma Stone for her compelling performance (those eyes! that mature voice!). The talent of her character is absolutely convincing because we hear it and see it in each of her scenes. The talent of Ryan Gosling (who is said to have taken a year or two of piano lessons prior to filming) is less apparent. Although he's insistent about his purist dedication to creative, acoustic jazz, we hear no more than a minute or two of authentic jazz throughout the entire course of the movie--and it's not from his plano playing. (The anemic "love theme" that he reprises in the movie's final scene is the playing of an amateur--and, so for that matter, are the other songs in the film. I know few musicians who would not believe that, given the assignment, they could do the same.)
Maybe that's the point--to enable today's viewer to "relate"--even to instrumental music. Hearing Art Tatum or Oscar Peterson would drive people away. The playing of Ryan Gosling and the songs in the score have the opposite effect. Maybe each of us should write a musical and seek the 30 million dolars to film it. (All the same, there's a song sung by Sarah Vaughan--"Words Can't Describe"--that offers a sublime melody with a perfectly fitted set of lyrics. Moreover, it's included on an album--"Swingin' Easy"--that lists the song as "Public Domain." That alone could be inspiration for a musical with at least one show-stopping, unforgettable song (along with a big savings in time and money spent on permissions and royalties).
I had no trouble whatsoever when Warren Beatty announced "La La Land" as the best picture of 2016. But when, moments later, the announcement was voided and "Moonlight" was declared the rightful winner, I was equally good with the Academy's pick.
40 people found this helpful
Reviewed in the United States on November 10, 2024
The music, the players, the scenery/sites, splendid blend of locations with music/plot are top drawer and far more intricate than any stage or screen musicals I've seen - at age 78. Many previous have memorable tunes. Some have one or two great performers - voice and acting. This has folks who come from nowhere and deliver strong stuff without reminding you they are not Judy Garland. The music and orchestral stuff is stronger and more affecting than most screen stuff I've seen - this would not work on stage but in film, high skill and emotional punch are endless. We returned to movie house 3X to get our fill - it will never go away. I play piano and even with sheet music, the stuff is hard work - when the players and director mix the music in - or turn a specific song - this is possible the most modern high level composing since Gershwin and far more appropriate in mixing with scenes/plots/individual cast member. U.S. media and Hollywood machine had no way to really applaud this - to be expected because Hollywood rarely hits this well and mostly slathers on simple or gory/skin junk. This is of the level but above what Bernstein wanted to, as careful but graceful as anything that Rodgers and Hammerstein did for stage (no movie of their play honored them - surprised?), and zesty like Chorus Line brought to the scene. I pray that a reprise of the contributors will show before I croak. This one filled up about two years of my adoration. It would be wonderful to move on with another top piece to run in my brain, over and over.
Reviewed in the United States on November 5, 2024
As a former resident of Los Angeles, I understand the allure and the struggle. This movie does a great job of showing two people sacrificing for their dreams. It's a great movie to study for all the nuances and even the very special ending. I had to have it. I've been on that Freeway though there were no singers or dancers. The opening scene shows what may not be self-evident! I've enjoyed the company of those dreamers. I've moved and taken my dreams with me. But I miss the place, even with its faults. It's a great reminder with classic scenery! Oh wait, I am going to watch it again! Wow! Great cinematography and shot on Kodak Vision 3 film. You don't get more classic than that!
Reviewed in the United States on October 26, 2024
La La Land is a film that was huge when it first came out. It was a critical darling and made a lot of money, and was the frontrunner for the oscars that year. (Though it would eventually lose to Moonlight). As it happens with every frontrunner, the film eventually fell under scrutiny as being "overhyped" and yadayadayada.
However, three years on, La La Land still holds up incredibly well. The music is swelling and gorgeous, the cinematography lush and warm, and the direction smooth and precise. Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone hold the film together, and their chemistry gives the film its life.
Bottom line: La La Land made me laugh a lot, made me cry a lot, and I still listen to the soundtrack every now and then with increasing fondness. I didn't need it to reinvent the wheel.
Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2024
Reviewed in the United States on November 3, 2024
This Story is a 'episodic' depiction of a Woman and a Man who discover and recognize their love of Music & Dance. Two People 'Feel The Vibe' and must Share their
being 'Drawn to Dance' together.
Reviewed in the United States on November 6, 2024
The entire show I kept on edge of seat loving it!!
Reviewed in the United States on September 25, 2024
I took a star off only because the opening 4-5 minutes feels a little forced. It's a good time if you're watching it in the evening with the wife or gf.
Top reviews from other countries
1.0 out of 5 stars Language check...
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 25, 2018
Sadly it wasn't abundantly clear that this DVD is printed in Spanish. Considering the cost it arrived as a great disappointment as it was intended as part of a Christmas gift. They wouldn't accept the return, despite their claim, without me paying for shipping - given it came from Spain this was not cost effective.
5.0 out of 5 stars Beau film et colis bien soigné
Reviewed in France on December 16, 2017
Beau film avec une musique exceptionnelle. Un moment de bonheur en famille. Belle voix de Emmanuela Stone. Bons acteurs et une mise en scène originale.
5.0 out of 5 stars LO IMPORTANTE ESTA DENTRO
Reviewed in Spain on May 27, 2017
Entrega perfecta de Amazon, y en cuanto al DVD pues correcto. Hay unos cuantos extras: Dos videos en relación a la película con entrevistas y comentarios con director, actores y demás; hay otro apartado de variados posters; otro donde te dirigen a cada una de las canciones del film y por ultimo el apartado de los creditos. En definitiva, como ya destaco en el titulo la joya del DVD esta en la maravillosa película que ha hecho Damien Chazelle. Una autentica obra de arte del cine.
PD: ¡Se me olvidaba! Quizás la única pega del DVD es el tipo de subtítulos utilizados. Creo que han intentado seguir con la estética de la canción "Someone in the Crowd" cuando salen los carteles de neón (al colocar los contornos exteriores a las letras) y han roto un poco la sencillez que debe predominar la grafía de los subtítulos.
5.0 out of 5 stars ララランド、最高！
Reviewed in Japan on March 16, 2018
映画を観て、どうしても手元に欲しくてしょうがなく、輸入品だけど、買いました。リージョンナンバーが違うので、輸入ＤＶＤは購入要注意です。
5.0 out of 5 stars Excelente precio y calidad 👌🏼👌🏼
Reviewed in Mexico on December 19, 2023
Llegó en tiempo y forma y muy cuidada. Respetaron el precio de promoción y es una chulada de película 😁👌🏼