Stars: Miles Teller, J.K. Simmons, Melissa Benoist, Paul Reiser
Director: Damien Chazelle
Oscar History: 5 nominations/3 wins (Best Picture, Supporting Actor-J.K. Simmons*, Film Editing*, Sound Mixing*, Adapted Screenplay)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars
I hated band class growing up. I wasn't particularly fond of a few classes in high school (or, let's face it, high school in general-it's rough being the gay kid in a small town), but band was the worst, and it was because my teacher wasn't particularly nice to me I used to dread going to my band lessons, as the teacher was constantly berating and/or yelling at me, and by senior year, I had decided to stop going, principally because I knew after I ventured to college I wasn't going to be picking up a mallet or drumstick again (take note teachers-your cruelty can deter future love of your subject). To this day, though, I cannot stand my band teacher, despite that being...a certain numbers of years ago, and still think of him as the worst teacher I ever had. Therefore, part of me when this film first started thought, "huh, I can kind of relate to this situation." Of course, once the outlandish started to enter, I realized that Whiplash, despite its high intentions and solid cast, never really could come close to reality.
(Spoilers Ahead) I will admit, of course, that my band teacher never threw a chair or a cymbal at me or made me bleed on my trap set, which is part of the premise of Whiplash, the latest film from Damien Chazelle, who is definitely having a "breakthrough" moment with the movie. The film is about an abhorrent educator Terence Fletcher (Simmons) who randomly selects a promising young student named Andrew Neyman (Teller) to be in his highly-selective jazz ensemble. The film follows Andrew as he at first struggles with Fletcher, finding him to be a tyrant, and then slowly watches as he becomes obsessed with gaining his approval, in an odd sort of Stockholm Syndrome. Andrew abandons everything that he holds dear, including his girlfriend (Glee's Melissa Benoist) and his strong relationship with his father (Reiser) and eventually even his education to try and gain Fletcher's respect, only to watch as his life falls to shambles in the process.
The film, admittedly, is a nice reprieve from the tired cliche about the musical prodigy who defies all the naysayers to be a brilliant artist. Nearly every film of this ilk would have had Andrew struggle from humble beginnings, move his way through a tough-but-fair mentorship, and eventually have the triumphant performance at Lincoln Center (wait-that kind of happens at the end here). I remember seeing at least one trailer, in fact, for a film that looks just like that in the trailers to this particular film. Instead, Whiplash already has what is clearly a very accomplished, though not yet "great" musician in Andrew, and this becomes something of a psychological snuff film. As the film continues, the movie becomes occasionally unbearable to watch-the scene where Fletcher alternates between three different drummers, torturing them with horrible slurs and making them bleed until one of them finally plays the part correctly is abhorrent. I actually heard gasps of "stop" from the audience, and I saw several people hiding their faces with their coats. This is the sort of reaction you usually get from a slasher film, not from a prestige drama. I don't know whether or not to thank Chazelle for defying convention or to give him a hug and say "who hurt you?"
Unfortunately, this level of intrigue and playing with the genre isn't enough to make the film particularly strong. While it's always best to leave villains without a backstory (the Joker, Hannibal Lecter, and the Wicked Witch were all far more interesting when they were just evil for the sake of being evil), here I feel like we may have gained a teensy bit from the sociopath in front of us. Simmons is too strong of an actor to not make this particular character fascinating (you can see the clear allusions to someone like Bobby Knight in his work), and I definitely see where the plaudits for the performance are coming from, but there's not enough finesse in the scenes, and he's hampered by a bad script. It's hard to see, for example, why Teller's Andrew remotely trusts him or thinks he's special in the first half of the film-it doesn't jive with anything about the character. Simmons also plays certain scenes too comically big, and is way too obsessed with a student that he doesn't think has "it" as it's very clear is a surprise in the movie's final scene.
Miles Teller is also giving a strong performance with a weak character arch. His character slowly slips into a shocking disregard for his own humanity, frequently sacrificing everything about himself in the process. This works in the script, and if this was all that was happening it wouldn't bother me, but is he also supposed to be a moron? Because only a fool would continue to trust Fletcher and make so many outlandish mistakes, which he does right up until the end. The car accidents, the forgotten alarms, the misplaced sticks-these are cheap plot points that don't remotely jive with Andrew's perfectionist ways.
The film is saved a bit by the ruthless ending, with Andrew demanding Fletcher's attention in front of an audience, slowly proving that he was worthy of his praise all along, and in the process we watch as his humanity is wrenched from him in the pursuit of a dream turned unhealthy obsession. The final moments in any other film would be worth celebrating, with Andrew finally earning the respect of his hard-edged teacher, but so much of his soul has been lost along the way that the audience is left crushed that this boy has lost his humanity in the pursuit of perfection. It's a great ending to a pretty lousy script, and almost makes you think the movie is better than it is.
Those are my thoughts on this film-what about yours? Do you think J.K. Simmons is about to stampede through every precursor award known to man before taking an Oscar? How excited are you by the career that Miles Teller has had since his splendid debut in Rabbit Hole? Was I the only person with very complicated feelings toward Whiplash? And does anyone have fond memories of their band teacher? Share in the comments!
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