I don't think I have ever been in love with a movie, like I'm in love with La La Land. From the first few seconds, till the very end. This movie had me and didn't let go. My english vocabulary is not good enough to express my love, heck, my dutch vocabulary is not good enough to express it. This movie is everything.
It is beautiful, happy, magical, romantic and I could go on for a little while longer but I won't. I wasn't expecting it to be this musical-y, but I mean, I love musicals so I'm not complaining. I think this is a great "musical" because there isn't non stop singing, so people who don't like musicals might like this one because it's more "subtle". I can only imagine how much practice went into all those dance routines and don't get me started on the impressive piano skills Ryan Gosling showed us.
Something that really impressed me as well was the way they filmed everything. It's a very creative and different way, which I really enjoyed and think makes this movie a great inspiration for those who love film and camerawork themselves. The build up and flashbacks and stuff were really cool as well. Yea I really enjoyed that. Also, the storyline, which does so much for a movie, was so great.
This is normally the part were I talk about the actors, but seeing that there were mainly only two actors and they were both amazing (I do think tho, that Ryan Gosling his character wasn't a very challenging one for him because we have seen him in roles like these before. Mixing it up with all the dancing, singing en piano playing though, you got something quite different and I loved it), I'm going to skip this part and say that you should watch this movie, do nothing more, just watch it, enjoyed it and love it.
[7.2/10] Certainly an interesting documentary. Through a combination of South Park’s extended scrap with Scientology, my own wiki-wormholing, and the scuttlebutt and articles that followed in the wake of this very film, I already had a decent grip on much of the information presented, taking away some of the punch of it. Still, seeing archival and recent footage of Scientology’s major figures past and present, and hearing the concerns and horror stories of former adherents in their own words (particularly Paul Haggis) was shocking and affecting.
You do get the sense that you’re only getting one side of the story, which, given the horrible things done through Scientology, isn’t the greatest sin, though does make it feel harder to trust what’s presented. Still, as Haggis said in his letter, if even a fraction of it’s true (and I believe the vast majority of it is, for the record), it reveals the horror and pernicious qualities of this organization in a fashion that shocks the conscience.
The film does a nice job at dividing its topics up into various chapters, making it possible to follow the themes and throughlines even when it becomes easy to mix up some of the personalities involved. Overall, I think someone less acquainted with Scientology’s ills and controversies would get more out of it, but it’s still an arresting look at the terrible things perpetuated in the name of this “church.”
