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It may be a fundamental but this was a concert, not a typical jazz show. I'm sure all those jazz greats back in the day still had songs they performed each time once they started making records. And I'd argue that John never did say they were a jazz band. I'd probably classify them more as funk because you can tell that while he does take inspiration from old jazz, he's also taking some clear inspiration from 70s funk, 80s synth pop, and putting a modern spin onto all of it.

Oh it's all good! This certainly wouldn't be the first time I misinterpreted a post lol!

CakeBug, I legit almost picked The Last Five Years last time as well. It's been sitting in my Netflix queue for quite some time but I've been waiting to watch it for the first time with all y'all. But then Fister made that wild review of J&TP and my decision was made lmao.

I loved it! It obviously has its flaws but I think there is a big reason why the hype was so loud! My question: Did anyone think this was worthy of Best Picture? Or was Emma worthy of Best Actress?

My poor ass: My god $250,000 is a lot of money.

For those that love Paul's stories about his job at Blockbuster, he is on Brooks Wheelan's podcast "Entry Level" today where it's all about the jobs you had before you could quit and do comedy (or other shit) full time.

True, but it's still overhearing that conversation that convinces him to walk into that rehearsal and then when he brings it up during their fight she doesn't deny that's what she wanted for him.

Ah I see now. Yeah I believe you're correct. It's hard to understand which "he" it is when you're talking about 2 dudes lol.

No, he said the last piano player was worse than him but Seb was more of a pain in the ass. He also said Seb would be making 1 grand A WEEK, so I imagine in 5 years he had more than enough to get a club.

I loved this first comment on that article (which was great btw thank you for sharing) THIS IS WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT PEOPLE And it's so true! Any time she needs to say her own lines the camera cuts to another scene until she's finished. We never see her act in the movie where the character was built around her. We never actually see her do anything she is actually passionate about save be with Seb.

It's interesting that you mention that because outside of Seb and her love of Hollywood we really don't have a clue who this woman is. She's someone that doesn't like parties and worshiped her aunt's glamorous lifestyle, but what does she do for fun? What kind of music did she listen to? It seems like we know a lot more about who Seb is as a solo person than we do Mia.

What I don't get is that she KNEW it was going to be something that made him miserable because HE KEPT TELLING HER it would be. So in my mind I still don't really understand why she is so surprised because he didn't want to go down that path until she convinced him to in order to make enough money to open the club.

But this is why it basically took me until today to realize that the narrative does changed once Seb realizes he was wrong about a lot (although it's usually just the stuff that him and Mia disagreed with), because up until that moment where we see that Seb took all of Mia's thoughts to heart it still paints him as the one with the correct stance on things. Obviously I'm not talking about the way he treats her dream and how he missed her show for the actual worst photo shoot I've ever seen on film ever, like cmon guy that lip bite was so unattractive it actually made me want to stop liking Ryan Gosling for a hot minute. But like after the moments with John, Seb still never changes his stance on "saving" Jazz. Like what it seems he takes to heart is the fact that he is an asshole to someone that was once his friend and pretty much an asshole to the girl he loves, but at the end of the movie he's got his old time jazz club that only plays old time jazz. So in the viewers mind he is still "correct" because we don't follow John Legend after that.

Question: Why does Mia go from being excited at his concert to like really concerned? Is it because she knows he isn't into this kind of music, is it because she's scared that he looks like he is into this kinda music now and he's letting go of his dreams, or is it because suddenly there's all these girls rushing the stage for her boyfriend?

WHAAAAAAAAT?

I think it's him telling her a story. The fantasy may be shared between them, but I think it's like him showing her what could have happened if he had made different choices. Because all of her choices were exactly the same in the scenario but this time he is the one who changed his life.

I do agree with y'all too except I'm totally in the camp of thinking he was like oh I could've been happy to follow her around and support whatever she wanted to do in life if I needed to with that final scene. But it's so interesting to me that we actually see the relationship not work out in the end because that really is what we see in Hollywood. Like there's a reason why when someone has been married to someone else for 8 years my mom will go "Holy crap that's long!" because in reality it really isn't that long of a marriage but in Hollywood that is. So we get this glimpse of a Spring to Fall romance that in our minds seems real and long and like they're meant to be, but it probably lasted all of 9 maybe 10 months max. What I love about seeing movies like this in the theaters is that when it was revealed that she was married to some other dude the entire crowd I was with groaned and then laughed about we all groaned at the same time lol.

I guess I felt like the movie was saying that because Seb was our "hero" and he kept talking about how John Legend was The Worst and how he didn't understand anything yadda yadda. But then when we actually meet John fully and hear his side of things I was suddenly like oh right no Seb is a fuckin idiot. Like opening an old timey Jazz club is a cool idea and loving the music is all fine and good, but I guess it's how Seb goes about all this that makes it seem like John is the villain of this story when really it's Seb himself because he's got his head stuck up his ass.

I took that as she overheard the fight with JK Simmons because she had walked in to hear him play, and then saw how disinterested he was compared to the rest of the cover band at the pool party. Her dancing to "I Ran" in such an exaggerated way was really funny to me and was kinda like the one time where I truly saw that this girl had a personality outside of just wanted to act.

I also vote to keep the opening number in, and I think it's my favorite number of the entire movie. Like tbh I think that sets everything up for me and then it just kinda goes downhill from there. Nothing is as strong as that was in my mind. Also funny enough watching it the second time I didn't like it as much as I did the first time, and I think that has a lot to do with the surprise aspect. I had no idea this was going to be a legitimate, reminiscent of the old days, kinda musical. I was expecting the usual shit we get these days and instead we got a real musical that probably would've been made in the 40s, 50s, 60s and that delighted me! So everything from the surprise of the musical numbers to the surprise of the story itself unfolding at the end, I think a lot of that actually needed the surprise factor to really work so when you rewatch it you just don't get the same feelings again. I think I might be in the minority because I loved watching Ryan and Emma just be in a relationship. Their chemistry is literally off the hook and while I would never ever call them Fred & Ginger I would in fact say it's so easy to see why this is their third movie together. Even if something doesn't work (like Gangster Squad) you do end up wanting to watch more of them falling in love together. The thing that bothers me is that you can tell they're not strong singers. Their voices are nice, but this is a musical first and foremost so nice voices don't really cut it. I wanted more every time either one of them started to sing, because I could feel their insecurity about it throughout the songs. The most egregious example was when they were both sitting at the piano singing City of Stars. It is a quiet song, but they just didn't have the voices (in my opinion) to pull off the quiet confidence. I get that because I don't really either. When I sing I need to do it loud because I feel like if I do something quiet and contained my voice will crack and I'm focusing on that the entire time rather than just singing, and that's kinda what I got from them too. The biggest "wtf???" moment though is actually why John Legend was positioned as a bad guy. I mean I know we can get into this "Ryan Gosling is a white man that wants to 'save' Jazz" later because that's an entire post in and of itself, but John Legend wasn't an asshole and he wasn't wrong. He tells Seb that Jazz is about the future and it's about being revolutionary but how can you be revolutionary if you're stuck in the past and the entire time I was like yeah wow he's right does Seb even understand what Jazz was created for or is he just a fanboy that could never truly understand the feelings the people are portraying through it? And lbr here John's song was amazing. It was stuck in my head the rest of the day yesterday after I watched this.

The show is Saturday. Anyone that's going to see it live can't wait.

Also holy shit was there no winner this week??? Lol of course the week where I think "Oh I've got this one IN THE BAG" there's no winner. That's what I get for assuming lol!

Paul I have so many recommendations for lenses!!!! I'd be more than happy to discuss what you're wanting to shoot! Without really knowing what you're photographing I think that the 50mm is obviously a stellar one to have and that's primarily what I shoot portraits with but there are a ton more that I'll tell you about. If you're wanting to do more portraits I would look into an 85mm lens. They are definitely pricier than most lenses because of how quality they are, and they get pricier as the f-stop number goes lower. The 85mm 1.2 is literally the creme of the crop though so if you are wanting the best of the best I would go with that one. A 35mm is also a super solid everyday kind of lens that isn't as zoomed as the 50mm but also is pretty accurate to what we would probably frame with our own eye. I also have a 20mm lens for wide angle shots when I'm trying to grab large groups of people and extremely large landscapes or architecture. The wide angle lenses aren't my favorite but they definitely come in handy if you're like me and at the Cliffs of Moher and want to get an impressive view of everything you see. Finally, if you really want a zoom lens that is high quality I would go with a 70-200mm telephoto lens. These are no joke. They're heavier than anything else and also pricier but so worth it if you're far away from a subject but really want to get in on it. It's pretty much what I use when photographing weddings because I can be on the other side of the ceremony or reception and still get up on the couple without disturbing any of the guests. These are also the lenses you'll see sports photographers use on the sidelines. They're giant and usually require a monopod just to hold the lens itself, but those are probably closer to the 70-300 or 150-600 lenses.