yes.... I did it again.... I bought another ticket to this film......

How does it feel to be watching La La Land for the third time in a month? It still whisks my soul away. I was surprised that I teared up again today - given how I've emptied my tear banks in my previous two watches AND have been thinking about this movie for three weeks now - but oh well. I guess it attests to the power of this film.

La La Land now feels like a classic to me and I have nothing except pure fondness and love for it; but I think, apart from this, I have also finally found words for a proper review.

This film meanders masterfully between the imaginary and the real world. Much of La La Land is staged like a theatre show: musical numbers performed by ensembles, Sebastian (Ryan Gosling) and Mia's (Emma Stone) spontaneous singing, the use of spotlights and dimmed backgrounds on said characters, and people soaring into the air. Yet the thing is, none of these feel unnatural. Even if there are moments (e.g. in the opening scene) where characters look directly into the camera at us. Everything feels so real. This comes mostly from how Sebastian and Mia are characters we can easily relate to: ordinary people with idols they look up to and aspire to emulate.

In this sense, La La Land is also very much character-driven, to the extent that the film (and, by extension, its world) revolves completely around its main characters. If La La Land were a fish bowl, Sebastian and Mia would be the two goldfish while everything else would be the bits of gravel.

Another aspect of this film that I admire is its effective translation of theatrical elements, maximising film as a unique, different medium from theatre. The camera movement has so much life to it - the movement mimics action which our eyes would have otherwise carried out looking at a theatre stage. Even in slower scenes (e.g. the pier "City of Stars" scene), this film's sense of life never wanes. In instances where the camera takes on a more conventional role of staying still, emotions take over. Apart from this I was fascinated by the nuanced use of spotlights as well. There is the this-is-my-shining-moment spotlight where warm light illuminates Sebastian/Mia while they are performing, but this is differentiated from the spotlight that shines on Sebastian and Keith (John Legend) when they perform on stage. In the latter case, a harsh white light casts shadows on the two men's facial features.

I don't think I can talk about emotional resonance without going into details about the plot... so if I may, I'll keep this broad. I am most fond of this film for how it reminded me of my own aspirations: the things that I have dreamed of achieving and tried to work towards. In the course of this, I have changed my goals and switched paths and at times, left behind things that my past self cherished. I found La La Land to be a bittersweet portrayal of this process - the film doesn't condemn it, but rather reminds us about the beautiful, daring and innocent dreams we once had.