Thursday, December 22, 2016

Movie Review: La La Land

Yay! The upside to going a week past your due date is getting to squeeze in one more Oscar hopeful with your Movie Date. Nothing else is out in our area that is a hopeful nominee, so we'll have to see what comes out in ATX for some January/February baby dates. You know you're in it for the long haul when you're willing to take off work to go to the movies just so Smoochie can come. Right, Allison? {grin} Anyway, last week Allison and I saw La La Land.


Plot: A jazz pianist falls for an aspiring actress in Los Angeles.

Review: This movie had so much hype around it, I think it would be hard for it to be as good as we hoped it would be. It was a really sweet story {if a little dull}, and it definitely had a nostalgic feel to it with the musical numbers, the costumes, etc. The characters and plot were likable which is always an added bonus. At the same time, it felt a little corny and dull? Ryan and Emma aren't the strongest singers/dancers, so there were a couple of times I was kind of uncomfortable, ha. We both liked it, but Allison liked it more than me. At about the halfway mark, I was underwhelmed for sure and the ending was kind of flat for me. I didn't hate it by any means but didn't love it like all the reviewers seem to. Allison gave it a B+/A-, and I gave it a B. 

Right now I would say my favorite Oscar hopeful is Manchester By the Sea and overall I haven't been very impressed by this crop of contenders - we'll see what the rest of Award season brings!


2 comments:

Kathryn Bagley said...

my sister went to see la la also and said it was ok! Christmas day SING comes out and im all over that one..lol

Karen Peterson said...

I did not love La La Land. It actually really annoyed me how much attention and love and praise it's gotten. The story is completely clichéd, which distracted me from the attempt at nostalgia. The lyrics and melodies to the songs were fine, but some of the songs should have just been MUCH bigger than they were. Like the opening number. Why were the singers so muted? It was weird.

And DON'T get me started on that terrible ending.

My personal favorite right now is Lion. But Casey was so good in Machester by the Sea.

Congratulations, by the way! Smoochie is beautiful!!