Review of Whiplash (2014) by Ricardo C — 05 Nov 2015

Whiplash follows the magnificent story of Andrew (played by Miles Tiller), a solo-drummer striving to be the next great jazz revolutionary of his time, and an adversary music teacher, Fletcher (J.K. Simmons). The two compete in a zero sum power relationship throughout the film. When one gives into to the other's prowess, the opposing character loses authority. For the most part, however, J.K. Simmons plays the power role in this film. From the very beginning, after Fletcher runs into Andrew by coincidence, Simmons holds the greater power, telling Andrew to play or stop playing. Already in their first encounter, Fletcher gains mastery of Andrew's lack of self-authority. Director Damien Chazelle does an excellent job of portraying the struggle between teacher and student by putting us right behind the drums themselves and allows us to feel the tension between Fletcher's aggressive, almost physically abusing teachings and Andrew's burning, aching desire to be the best there's been. These cinematic effects are much more emotionally appealing than if we had just seen Fletcher yelling at Andrew from a camera off-stage. Chazelle should also be applauded for his music selection in the movie. Being a musician for the past eight years, I know that both "Whiplash" and "Caravan" do a phenomenal job of projecting the emotions of the incredibly dynamic characters. Both songs are very uptempo and swung very, VERY hard. Also, the music perfectly complements the script. Caravan has a very intense, difficult drum solo that leads into the end of the movie. Ironically, if any of the songs in the movie are to represent the plot, it's not "Whiplash", but rather "Caravan". Since earlier in the film, Damien presents Andrew with a struggle. He makes it impossible for Andrew to accomplish playing in "double-time" swing. This requires hours, weeks, and months of practice and skill as the swing is at an insanely fast tempo, requiring Andrew's wrist to move at an unhuman speed. However, Damien Chazelle gave this struggle a double purpose. Not only does he finally gain the ability to play double time swing by the end of the movie; metaphorically, he overcame an even bigger feat, finally beating his damn music teacher in the war for power. Or so we think...

Upon watching for a third time, I begin to see that the finale of the movie is not as triumphant as we think. Throughout the movie, cinema effects and music choices all show us that Andrew's ultimate goal is not to become great, but to prove his teacher wrong. All the time, we've been thinking Andrew was the hero; trying to become the best. However, Fletcher's goal was to create his own prodigy in order to fulfil his own narcissistic ego. During the last scene of the movie, Fletcher makes a fool of Andrew by switching up the order of the songs to one that he does not know. He then comes back on stage and overrules Fletcher's authority and begins to play the song that he knew the best: "Caravan". People applaud for him because he finally showed everyone how good he is, right??? Wrong. All Andrew did was do what Fletcher wanted all along and come back to him in order to show everyone how good a teacher he is.

It took me three times to really understand what Damien had wanted us to see all along, a tragic, yet falsely triumphant ending for Andrew. I believe that any movie with a great choice of actors, excellent music choice, deeply symbolic messages, and such a greatly dynamic character struggle like the one shown in Whiplash deserves your time and money. GO WATCH IT.