La La Land, a place for dreamers and lovers, optimism and melancholy, beauty and talent. All of these things converge in a dizzying euphoria of musical numbers, conversations, glances, and panoramas that comes together in this beautiful, life-affirming story of two dreamers living in the City of Stars.

Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone give phenomenal performances, putting everything they have in making the dancing and singing sequences fly off the screen with a buoyant gracefulness. Damien Chazelle struck gold with this pitch perfect casting (even if he originally had Miles Teller and Emma Watson in the leading roles) and directs the film in such a way that every movement of the camera and every scene plays out in a way that seems downright effortless. There's a scene early in the movie where the camera follows someone diving into a swimming pool, submerges into the water, comes up to the surface and spins around, slowly increasing in speed, as it perfectly captures the spirit of the party, only to continue its path to pan up on a shot of exploding fireworks in the night sky. And this isn't a rare occurrence for the movie, as shots like this are littered throughout the breezy two hour run time.

The romance between Gosling and Stone is mesmerizing, showing two people form a connection while struggling to pursue their passions: his being jazz and hers being theater. There's a very apparent chemistry between them that sizzles in every scene they're in together and their romance is engrossing until the very last shot. While I wouldn't consider myself a fan of musicals (in fact I don't know that I've ever sat down and watched one from start to finish) this movie is so good that whether or not I like musicals is in no way correlated to how much I enjoyed this. Every musical number is gorgeously written and impeccably choreographed, with some seriously impressive moves from the two leads.

I don't have enough words to describe how good this movie really is. But there's one word in particular that comes to mind: perfect.