Review of Whiplash (2014) by Calum R — 08 Oct 2017

An ambitious, young drum player Andrew Neyman (Miles Teller) attends a prestigious music school where he plays for Terrence Fletcher's (J.K. Simmons) jazz band. Fletcher is known to be an extremely tough and stressing conductor with incredible talent. While performing for Fletcher, Andrew finds himself prioritizing drumming over sleeping and relationships with his family and girlfriend. He practices for rigorous, extensive hours a day often until his hands bleed and are unable to continue. The film has won multiple academy awards, but is often noted to lack believability.

Fletcher is extremely hard on his students for things a conductor should reasonably be upset at such as being off tempo or not memorizing sheet music. The film; however, exaggerates this anger where fletcher throws a chair over Andrews head, physically slaps his to better his tempo, and emotionally abuses him by bringing up his family issues in front of the whole class. Although certain scenes of the film are over exaggerated and unrealistic, the general message is still valid: passion is poison.

This intense theme is portrayed vividly with explicit scenes throughout the film. Andrew is seen practicing an intense piece when his hand starts to bleed. Instead of stopping to rest, he soaks his fist in ice water, bandaged the wound, and continues to play. He repeats this until his practice is over. Another scene shows Andrew running late to one of Fletcher's performance. Andrew gets into a brutal accident where his car flips over and his face splits open. Instead of rushing to the emergency room, he rushes make the performance on time. These scenes portray passion on the highest level. With the music industry being an extremely competitive field passion separates the talented from the determined, and Andrew was determined to keep his spot in the jazz band.

The movie could be shortly described as intense. This is supported through the film's soundtrack as well as the title named after one of the songs "Whiplash." Whiplash is and injury caused by a severe jerk in the head. As a drummer, Andrew is constantly swaying his head with the tempo of a song, and the song Whiplash is played at an extremely high pace. The song perfectly correlates with the movies intensity and theme on passion.

Whiplash is a perfectly crafted film portraying an extravagant message on passion in the music industry. Although some scenes may be seen as unrealistic, the intensity of them is further supported through the soundtrack, title, and theme. The exaggeration is there with the purpose of creating a thrilling, seat- edging film, and it does exactly that. All of these different aspects come together to form a creative and unique take on a real life based plot.