Whiplash – Oscar Best Picture Nominees 2015

Hello Friends,

The journey through the eight Best Picture nominees of 2015 is winding down. This is the second-to-last review of Oscar season! There’s no better film to be reviewing than Whiplash. A whirlwind of a ride, Whiplash was written and directed by Damien Chazelle, based upon his experiences in the Princeton High School Studio Band, and is the story of Andrew Neiman (Miles Teller), a first-year jazz student at the Shaffer Conservatory in New York. Neiman wants to win the approval of studio band conductor Terence Fletcher (J.K. Simmons), who is abusive towards his students. Neiman devotes himself to practicing, breaking up with his girlfriend in order to stay focused, and tenuously wins a spot as the core drummer in the studio band, although he is in constant jeopardy of being replaced. On his way to a jazz competition, Neiman is hit by a car, but still insists on going on stage. He is badly injured, and unable to play, and Fletcher tells him that he “is done;” Andrew attacks Fletcher on stage, and is subsequently expelled from Shaffer. A lawyer approaches Neiman and asks him to testify on behalf of one of Fletcher’s former students, Sean Casey, who hanged himself after working with Terence Fletcher. Neiman agrees, and Fletcher is fired. Later, Neiman encounters Fletcher at a jazz club where Fletcher is playing, and Fletcher invites Neiman to play for him at Carnegie Hall. In order to get revenge for being fired, Fletcher doesn’t give Neiman the music for the first piece the group plays, humiliating Neiman. Neiman starts to leave the stage, but decides to stay and play, and begins playing Caravan, the piece he was expelled from Shaffer over. He finishes with an incredible drum solo, and seems to earn Fletcher’s respect for his playing.

Miles Teller. What is there really to say about Miles Teller. This kid. I just don’t even know. I had no idea what I was in for when I entered the movie theater and sat down for his performance. And goodness, does this kid perform, in far more ways than one. A Tisch graduate, Teller spent months and months transforming himself into the beautiful musician he plays on-screen, saying to Rolling Stone, “I would have felt like such a douchebag if I were doing this movie and couldn’t drum. When I first started bleeding on the drumstick, I felt validity.” Watching Andrew Neiman (Teller) struggle, and scrap, and cry, and bleed over this dream of his was one of the most inspiring things I’ve ever seen. I’ve come to expect the bro-comedy (bromedy? like bromance?) from Miles Teller, but this was an epic leap. If you’ve seen him in Divergent, and you thought, “eeeeehhhhhhhhh” about seeing this movie, I promise you he doesn’t disappoint. Some of his facial expressions are so honest it actually hurts. This is most definitely a star to watch.

And the magical, terrifying counterpart to it all – J.K. Simmons. Does he have a first name? Am I seriously going to be typing J.K. for the whole next paragraph?? Moving on. I remember him as “that funny dad in Juno.” Looking at his IMDB, apparently he’s been doing so much more than that, he’s become that actor I see in everything but can never remember his name. Let me tell you, I’m going to remember it now. Simmons is the sun in this movie. If Teller is a star, Simmons is the milky way. (I’m not good at science, okay? Leave my terrible analogies alone.) The point is, Simmons is blazing on-screen, he is shining, he is enormous, he takes up the entire frame every single time. He is one of the best villains I’ve seen all year. Maybe in many years. But he’s complex! Unlike a cartoon villain, Simmons doesn’t just want world domination, Pinky and the Brain style. He wants magic, beauty, art, and is the complete antithesis to what he wants it made my brain hurt. It’s almost impressive how far Fletcher is willing to go in order to create great music. It’s almost as if his humanity is centered around one thing – creating the perfect moment of sound. And everything else is all about that too. Nothing else matters. Who cares if you have to throw something at a kid in order to get the sound you need? What does it matter if there’s one child out there who decides never to play music ever again because of the things you said to him? As an educator, I’m horrified, but Fletcher would say, “well then he shouldn’t have been playing in the first place, because he was never going to make it.” It’s a crazy world view, and Simmons embodies it so well, with such an insanity he seems almost rational. Simmons is mild-mannered, even when he’s enraged and crazy. He’s not the “evil cackle” kind of villain, but rather the driven, single-minded villain, more like a hollywood version of a serial killer, someone who is so focused on the end goal they don’t see morality. Simmons has truly surprised me with this performance, and I bet he’ll surprise you too.

Can we talk about the writing? In an age where every other second we’re adapting films from books, tv shows, comic books, songs, musicals, or rides from Disneyland (Pirates of the Caribbean was great, but honestly…), this is a breath of fresh air. This is the creativity and genius I’ve been waiting for Hollywood to bring back for such a long time. I mean, Chazelle wrote this based upon his owns life experiences. HIS OWN LIFE EXPERIENCES. WHAT?!?! This is a film that’s based in something that really happened, in real life, and while it definitely was never as crazy as this film, my mind is blown that some guy woke up, had an experience, and decided, “this would be a good movie.” Is it sad that this is my thought process? That it’s so shocking for creativity and goodness to come straight from a person’s brain and not filtered through forty-five adaptations first? Thank goodness. Thank goodness this movie was made. I loved that Simmon’s character was so completely evil, rather than just “a good guy who is misunderstood.” I mean, underdogs and anti-heroes are great and all, but sometimes you just need a bad guy! There are moments, moments of humanity that break through, and then get torn down with a viciousness that is terrifying and thrilling. I absolutely loved J.K. Simmons’ performance, but we can’t possibly forget that the man wasn’t ad libbing. Whiplash felt true to me. I remember music school. I remember being a child actor. I remember telling my friends I couldn’t hang out with them because I had to practice, and telling my high school boyfriend there was no way I was going to settle for going to a college near home just so we could be together. This, although exaggerated, is what it’s like to live for a dream. I appreciated, even more than the performances, the reminder that there have been and there are people who will push themselves to the limit in order to get what they want. In a land of accidental fame, reality tv, and people who make money for creating iPhone apps, this film hearkens back to an earlier time, a time where rising to the top was about hard work, not about happy accidents, or dumb luck. I feel like this is a story about how the rest of the economy is…no longer do you just do your job and get promoted. Now everyone has all of the degrees, everyone is competing for such a small slice of the pie, and in Hollywood cute girls and buff guys just wander onto a set, because they were willing to start their careers with Survivor or Shark Tank. (I’ve never seen either of those shows, so no offense.) There are days when I’m not sure the arts are about art anymore; but then you go and see Whiplash and remember that it’s out there being made every day.

Whiplash is an incredibly intense film, and not an easy watch. There is now a term, the Whiplash Backlash, that describes the jazz lover’s experience after watching this film. Having said that, I don’t regret a single second I spent in the theatre. Whiplash is a vibrant display of human emotions, about what to do when you don’t think you can do anything else. How far can you go when your body stops moving and won’t let you go any farther? What are you willing to give for the thing you love? How much? How much is too much? How far is too far? At what point does humanity intercede when the genius of creation is exploding? Whiplash is willing to ask these questions. I don’t know if I got any answers, but I sure liked trying, and wrestling, and considering my own life. This is the kind of film that makes you think, that makes you ask yourself, “what matters to me?”

Whiplash is, in my opinion, the king of the Oscars tonight. I think it deserves Best Picture, even above all of the other films out there. Does the Academy agree with me? I don’t know. Part of me finds it incredibly doubtful – typically the Academy doesn’t go with the hardest choice. They don’t always choose the film that artistically has done the best work. If they did, Argo could never have won. Just saying. Having said that, there are a number of movies in the category that (to my novice eye) don’t hold a candle to Whiplash, or Birdman. There are some films that seem incomplete in comparison (The Imitation Game, I’m looking at you). So it’s possible, not probable, but possible that I’m right, and Whiplash will be properly awarded for its genius. A must see for all artists everywhere, I would most certainly show Whiplash in any classroom, and ask my students to really think critically about limits – what they are, and where they should be, if there should ever be any.

Keep on keepin’ on Write Readers…we’ve got just one more!

Live, Love, Learn,

Rebecca &