whiplash

I kind of wanted to argue with Simmons that Charlie Parker wouldn't have necessarily agreed with people who told him that he was merely good enough or that he wouldn't have realised when he wasn't up to scratch (not that I'm saying he wouldn't have benefitted from help).

Maybe Simmons' character says things like that to justify his harshness.

this film was a big 'So What'

I am waiting for someone to make a moving like Whiplash about the Magic Band. That would probably be a great movie.
― One bad call from barely losing to (Alex in SF), Thursday, 15 January 2015 18:56 (4 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

OTM. Casting would be fun.

zlatan imbrahimovic as zappa

I loved the sticker in the kid's room, something about if you can't cut it as a jazz drummer, you end up in a rock band.

Generally true that there are some great rock drummers with serious jazz chops.

i really enjoyed this movie. there were some real filmmaking 'chops' on display.
kid millions article is OTM though-'drumline' is better.
and as he pointed out, this is really a sports movie, it's not about art at all.

i totally believed that the teacher would torpedo that performance to fuck over the kid, just this once. he cost him a really prestigious job at fake juilliard! that's got to be up there in jobs for jazzbos in 2014.

I really liked it too. It had a certain narrative tension and energy that most other films I've seen recently are lacking.

I don't think it's a particularly deep film however - but I don't hold that against it.

It had a certain narrative tension and energy that most other films I've seen recently are lacking.

OTM. It was somewhat ludicrous but you couldn't deny the momentum of the storytelling. Well-directed too, a very nicely maintained aesthetic. JK a shoe-in for Best Supporting, no?

if chazelle was announced as the new mission impossible movie helmer or something i would be excited. the whole car crash sequence is pretty silly but has a sense of pace and momentum and camera placement that's better than most current action directors.

enjoyed this film. part of me thinks it could have just as easily been about competitive running/baseball/eating instead of jazz drumming, and I agree with the Slate article that much of it conflates 'genius' and 'greatness' with technical proficiency. But who cares? It's a film full of feeling, it's brilliantly shot and scripted, and it's an incredibly compelling story.

Technical proficiency IS important, but that doesn't mean that throwing things, name calling, yelling, and other bad behaviors motivate someone to be technically proficient. At least some reviewers have bought into the film's tough love message, too, including Brian Tallerico, and I don't believe the message is as ambiguous as others itt have said. I'm willing to go the Deci/Ryan/Kohn route and favor descriptive feedback over empty praise, but only if that descriptive feedback is offered in the context of unconditional love. I definitely don't think, as Tallerico writes, that we're in an "era of praise" (this is rank recency illusion), I don't think kids are spoiled by encouragement, and I don't think "true talents (have) been left to wither because they were over-watered." What does this even mean: "He’s not 100% wrong when he says that the most dangerous two words in the English language are 'good job.'"? So he's 10% right that the most dangerous two words in English are "good job"? It's nonsensical. I don't need tough love propaganda, no matter how well made, and this movie is the second time in 12 months I've bailed on a movie or show for trying to justify this behavior.

Are you taking the film too personally? I think it's clear we're seeing someone with sociopathic behaviour not a role model.

The concepts of passion, inspiration, creativity, ideas, innovation etc. must be so difficult to represent on film. It's these factors which tend to be jettisoned, in terms of focus, from most music-based movies I've seen, often in favour of the artists' relationships and personal conflicts in the day-to-day world.
I've been so disappointed with films like Walk the Line, Control and others because they concentrated so little on the actual creative process. All too often the music itself becomes an ulterior soundtrack to a troubled love affair or drug abuse story. I get the commercial reasoning behind this, and of course it's all relevant to the life of the artist, but as a music fan I find these elements less interesting than the music itself.

So in a way, I found it refreshing that Whiplash was so brutal when it came to Niemann's relationship; to his girlfriend, his father, his family etc. He becomes, in a way, as cold and detached as his mentor (possibly more so - there is evidence that the tutor has a much warmer side in private). With Whiplash, we were spared any huggy 'win the competition, get the girl' narratives, and the rest of his family simply worked as a backboard for his anxieties.

Still, it's a shame that such a fantastic piece of cinema should again reject any narrative about the creative process in favour of technical mastery. I realise that this is a big part of what the film is about, but I also wonder when anyone will make a music movie that aims to honestly represent the creative process in an interesting way. Is it possible?

The creative process = hours of tedious noodling about until you hit on something with faintest wisp of potential to not be shite... ime.

Yes - it is. Very much so. But if you can make a film about hours of tedious hitting skins with sticks in a formulaic and pre-ascribed way, then surely...?

Frank did a fairly good job of this, actually I thought. We Are The Best wasn't too bad for it too, in representing those first baby-steps when it comes to trying your hand at something creative you have no idea how to approach.

xps

So why is the reviewer at rogerebert.com so taken with his pedogogy? And why does the film seem to validate his pedogogy by having Simmons smiling at Teller in approval at the end of the movie? Does the film really characterize Fletcher as a sociopath (which seems like an extreme interpretation to me) or just as an abusive asshole and a highly demanding teacher? What evidence is there that the writer/director doesn't feel that the highly external forms of motivation employed in the movie are more powerful at producing greatness than a more "authentic" internal motivation or more benign external motivations relating to the pleasures of music?

And the movie is just so gratingly narrow and out of touch with contemporary attitudes about jazz, even among jazzbos. I can't understand why the writer/director chose jazz as his milieu except as a contrivance.

As a drama, the movie is either incredibly two-dimensional or it's trying to show the conflict between what it takes to achieve greatness and the person who has to suffer through it to become great. What other dramatic dynamism is there? By the movie's standards, Andrew certainly becomes a great jazz drummer. He achieved what he set out to achieve, and I imagine that Fletcher felt the same way, so is Fletcher really going to say at that point, "Gee, I was wrong"?

i figured, arsehole or not, that we're supposed to sympathise ever so slightly with Fletcher. Like, that bit where they meet up and have a drink after Fletcher got sacked from the university; there's no denying he's a sociopath but also I believed him when he said that in his eyes he was acting in the best faith possible and genuinely wanted to produce a 'great' (but never managed to).

a lot of parallels with this film and army-based drill sergeant movies like Officer & a Gentleman (and especially) Full Metal Jacket.

since FMJ was a REAL DI, do we have audio of any jazz teachin' sadists in action?

As mentioned on this thread, the young drummer's idol in the film is Buddy Rich, who was famously recorded berating his band members:

http://jazztimes.com/articles/20010-the-buddy-rich-tapes

... Don storms into a rehearsal room and tells the Magic Band, "All you guys do is eat and shit"

As for the final scene - i felt it consolidated a lot of unaddressed issues that had been prevalent throughout the film.
First of all, Niemann defies his teacher's regimented, hardline approach to music-making by rising above him and encouraging his entourage to take part in an innovative freestyle approach. This is what music-making, and especially jazz, is arguably about. It's as though, through sheer drive and determination - but most of all rule-breaking - he has finally transcended 'greatness', as opposed to remaining a mere drum student beholden to replicating the greats through rote.
Secondly, Fletcher finally achieves his dream of producing a 'great'. This develops in front of his eyes and he is finally forced to go with it and accept that there are limits to his approach.
In all, both parties wind up in the best possible situation, but it's a complicated, attritional pact.

A Best Supporting Role should have been awarded to Simmons' bulging head veins. If it had been a 3D movie, I'd have been freaked right out.

this movie + We Are the Best! are basically complete opposites on every level. (I vastly prefer the latter.)

enjoyed this film. part of me thinks it could have just as easily been about competitive running/baseball/eating instead of jazz drumming, and I agree with the Slate article that much of it conflates 'genius' and 'greatness' with technical proficiency. But who cares?

That's why I said it reminded me of Nadia -- the abusive controlling coach, the idea that you have to sacrifice everything in order to achieve greatness (as if greatness were the only worthwhile goal) and who cares? I do! I think this is the sort of attitude is really harmful. And grossly macho.

Back to Nadia -- she was great because she was graceful and technically proficient in equal measure. If you look at the gymnasts who came after her and performed with technical proficiency, they lacked her style and grace. They were not great. Style and grace can't be bullied into a person. I hate this type of teaching so much.

That said I'm sure it's a very exciting movie but I really wish it were about competitive running or something else that (pardon me for saying this) doesn't require the same degree of creativity as making music.

And why does the film seem to validate his pedogogy by having Simmons smiling at Teller in approval at the end of the movie?

To me the movie played like we're supposed to accept Niemann as sociopath-in-waiting.

on the upside i do feel very motivated to practice now

also this "year in music film" piece did a nice job tying it all up http://www.wonderingsound.com/feature/music-film-2014-whiplash-we-are-the-best-frank/

To me the movie played like we're supposed to accept Niemann as sociopath-in-waiting.

Yes. The more I think about this movie, the more I think there's a (possibly unintentional) subtext where everything being ostensibly championed by both professor and student - technical proficiency over creative nuance, competitiveness over feeling and enjoyment, work vs play, objectivity over subjectivity, tough love over positive encouragement - are all being critiqued rather than upheld here.

LL, I would say go and see it - I really think it redeems itself and transcends its accusations in the end.

The reviews calling it fun and exhilirating confuse me. It's exhausting!

I'm afraid if I see it I'll leave the theater really aggravated. I guess that could be productive? Maybe.

There's that really dreadful part where the family(?) are sitting round the table and talking about their various achievements. Niemann acts in a completely unsympathetic way, degrades his friends/cousins' (not sure who these guys were) achievements and snaps at them when they ask if music isn't subjective.

I wasn't sure if i was supposed to think he was being a dick or correct.

LL - I honestly spent the first thirty minutes thinking if I wasn't with my friends, I'd walk out. But yeah, it's only today that I think it was a redemptive movie which at least asks intelligent viewers to take it on more than face-value and question a lot of the values it appears to uphold.

I wasn't sure if i was supposed to think he was being a dick or correct.

― guess that bundt gettin eaten (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, January 21, 2015 2:45 PM (47 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yeah, I guess? I mean, are you supposed to be on Fletcher's side in this film? Are you supposed to think 'What a cool, no-nonsense anti-hero who puts his career and reputation on the line for the good of his students', or simply 'Wow, what an absolute fucking psychopath, I hope he dies before the end of the film'. I feel it's a mixture of both, and the same goes for Niemann.

Is there a similar film about an abusive director?

Not that comes to mind -- The Stunt Man, maybe -- but any biography of Otto Preminger or Fritz Lang might do.

the director in Irma Vep played by Jean-Piere Léaud is monstrous in his passive-aggression.

the film is about a guy who believes that it will take brutal discipline for him to become a great and the mentor he found who forced it on him. at worst i think the movie allows for the possibility that simmons is right, and while i understand if that grosses people out, i think that ambiguity makes it more powerful than if simmons more transparently earned his just desserts.

the film is about a guy who believes that it will take brutal discipline for him to become a great and the mentor he found who forced it on him

Niemann chose to go there though; he had several chances to walk away. Otherwise I think the rest is otm.

i apologize if my shorthand was confusing, but by "believes it will take brutal discipline" i'm acknowledging that he chose to go there. but even then jk took it to unexpected, abusive levels

it's not unlike the end of payne's election - despite his humiliation and exile, matthew broderick still thinks he's a good guy who's doing ok, just as everyone does in their closing narration. objectively, jk simmons has been fired from a prestigious gig and just lost an extremely high-profile dick-measuring contest with his student. but he still has the self-satisfied nod of someone who thinks it was all worth it in the end.

I like Sion Sono but I feel a bit weird about his reputation for going nuts at actors. On the documentary for Love Exposure it even shows you him making his lead actress cry.

Apologies if this has been posted already:

http://www.kcet.org/arts/artbound/counties/los-angeles/drummer-peter-erskine-on-whiplash-film.html

I can't understand why the writer/director chose jazz as his milieu except as a contrivance.

Or maybe because he's a former high-school jazz drummer and Buddy Rich nut.

da croupier OTM re: the movie's attitude to Fletcher's philosophy.

I really wished at some point someone would have told JK Simmons that nobody likes this kind of music. Or I wish the movie was inspired or compelling enough to make me not think of that.

anyone seen this?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Piano_%28film%29

i should see this, huh?

anyone seen this?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Piano_%28film%29

― Number None

Yes. Moderately entertaining, very very silly.