When the entire audience of a cinema goes silent enough to
hear the fingers losing the pin – let alone it hitting the floor – you know a
film is working. When it happens not once but twice, three times or more;
pure cinematic magic is being performed. In this instance, the wand is a drum
stick, and the film is Whiplash,
Damien Chazzele’s drama about jazz student Andrew (Miles Teller), a quiet but hard-working
drummer determined to rise through the ranks. Believing he’s been given his
chance when band master Fletcher (J.K. Simmons) recruits him to a prestigious
music conservatory, Andrew soon finds himself pressured to breaking point by
teaching methods bordering on psychosis.
At the heart of Whiplash
is a furious battle between two of the finest screen performances in years, a
furnace of raw talent fuelled by a script sharp enough to cut diamond. Teller
is disciplined and nuanced with just the right level of emotional leverage to
sell the façade of someone desperate to give their life meaning, whilst Simmons
engulfs the screen as a sinewy, black-clad monster that some have compared to
Sergeant Hartman of Full Metal Jacket
but for my money bears more resemblance to Darth Vader with Tourette’s.
Though there’s drama and tension to spare, the script also
manages to find room for laugh-out-loud black comedy and plot twists shocking
enough to make M. Night Shyamalan’s hair curl. The interior design and colour
palette of the film present a warm, golden-brown hue of wood and brass that
lulls you into a sense of calm and comfort before the dialogue snaps you
straight back into the drama without pause for breath. The writing also takes
into account the effect of our young protagonist’s climb to stardom on those
around him, whether it’s his concerned father or the timid young woman with
whom Andrew strikes up a brief relationship before the cut-throat path to
perfection leads him away.
For those among you worried that your taste in music will
put you off the film, fear not: I can’t stand jazz and am bored easily by
languorous drum solos but I’ll be damned if I didn’t enjoy the heck out of the
music in this film. Every piece of music – especially the titular Whiplash – begins to take on a character
of its own as the skill level soars higher and higher and Andrew is forced to
play faster, harder and longer than ever before with each passing suite,
culminating in a sequence so palpably powerful you’ll be left sporting a knee
that won’t stop jiggling up and down.
With the sheer number of individually brilliant elements fused gloriously together, it
is no wonder many are hailing Whiplash
as a triumph of modern cinema: it is a blood-smeared shot of adrenaline into
the slack vein of awards season predictability and makes a more intense, funny
and smart study of a tortured artist than Birdman
could ever hope to be. Prepare to leave your seat with enough energy to run
a mile and back in time for the next showing, and believe me; you’ll want to do
just that.
★★★★★
