The 2017 Academy Award for Best Picture was mistakenly given to Damien Chazelle’s La La Land, then given instead to its proper recipient Barry Jenkins (Moonlight). La La Land’s cast and crew had time to gather onstage, physically receive Oscars, and dive into their acceptance speeches. Emma Stone had time to begin tearing up with joy, before the mix-up came to light, and the award was transferred to the makers of Moonlight. A fan of La La Land may think this a terrible and senselessly painful moment for director Damien Chazelle. Yet this is the only possible result of his film. To have the grail of cinematic achievement snatched out of reach, in the very moment of grasping it, is built into the DNA of his film. A cosmic mistake marred the legacy of La La Land’s Oscar achievements, yet Chazelle is the responsible party. The man ruined his own movie.

Romanticism is the portrayal of the world, not as it is, but as it ought to be. This movie is nothing if not Romanticism. By Chazelle’s own decision then, it is nothing. The movie is transcendent in its commitment to the medium of film, its commitment to Los Angeles as the birthplace of cinema. The dance numbers burst with life and beauty, and in place of special effects are the blood, sweat and tears of hundreds of true artists. The final minutes of the film then declare the ultimate futility of this achievement when faced with a vast, uncaring reality, and thus is another piece of visual alchemy murdered in its very moment of achieving timelessness.

The most potent statement of La La Land’s themes is contained in the opening highway scene. We see hard, brutal reality in the form of stop-and-go LA traffic. Then we see the invisible work of hundreds of crewmen, dancers, choreographers, and director Damien Chazelle all unite in glorious craftsmanship to transform this all-too-familiar world into a frame in which true magic occurs. Drivers leap out of their cars to dance and sing with each other in exaltation, the music lifts you and the dancers both to embrace the sunlight and everything it could bring, the movie presents itself as a tribute to a human’s ability to chase their dreams, and by this chase, achieve them. A rude awakening in the form of a car horn and a middle finger marks the re-introduction of a brutal, callous, real world. This is a proper beginning for any hero’s journey. The dance of objective reality and subjective goals makes the backbone of La La Land’s plot. A proper plot would integrate these opposed themes into a greater harmony. 

A proper piece of art integrates itself into the medium it's contributing to. It’s clear what medium La La Land proposed to contribute to: Romanticism. Specifically, Hollywood’s brand of it, where the audience is lifted from their daily lives into a dramatic, bombastic portrayal, not of what life is, but of what life could be, of what it should be. Each of the movie’s low points of forced compromise, and failure to achieve greatness, serve as foils for the dance numbers that follow, which show with music and dance that the power of dreams and romantic love can transform all of this. Each foray into failure raises the stakes of the characters’ missions, and every celebratory song of triumph more fantastically integrates this brutality into a more glorious vision of what the world could be. The final dance number of the film is the peak of this rhythm, and we see one song performed for a lost love reach back in time to heal all wounds, and bring the two dreamers into each other’s arms with the power of free will wedded to destiny. 

This is the proper conclusion of a piece of Romanticism. But Chazelle decides to murder his art after giving birth to it. The runtime continues past the point of resolution, to show that this victory of the human spirit is only a dream, and reality is always going to be lesser than. The lovers see the potential life that could have been, smile with tender bitterness, and walk away from each other for good. Not because this is what they want, but because life doesn’t care what they want, and life gets its way in the end. This was in fact one of Chazelle’s artistic intentions from the beginning: to show a romantic fantasy that stays in touch with (his idea of) hard-bed reality. 

My argument is that this is a direct contradiction of everything the film itself stands for. We do not go to the theatres, to watch a musical like La La Land, to be reminded that reality always wins, despite anything we may dream of achieving. Day-to-day reality already delivers this message with great effectiveness. Instead, we watch movies like this to be reminded of what is possible, of what could be, of what should be. We need this art to remember what is in our power to pursue, and by the pursuit, we achieve the even greater reward of self-esteem. This is the purpose of Romanticism: to show us, not existence itself, but the ideal of existence, thus giving us a completed vision, a reference to model our goals upon. 

The critic may then respond, ‘The remedy which this movie proposes is the height of ridiculousness! One performance of one song, however much shared history resides in it, can’t alter the course of history. Such time-reversing, universe-healing magic is not possible within our world, and it only wastes your time to imagine that it is.’ Yet it is art alone that can portray a world where this is possible. This magic-creation is one of the primary purposes of Romanticism. By defaulting on this power, Chazelle contradicts everything Romanticism, and La La Land, stands for. 

By this betrayal, Chazelle places his work in the insane position of being beaten by the Twilight Saga. Structurally, Twilight is the stronger piece, by default of refusing to betray itself. It’s cohesive. Every romantic conflict ultimately adds to the power of its resolution. La La Land contradicts itself with just one piece: the final moment of the lovers parting ways. A physical body cannot live if even one of its parts is set against the whole. The same is true for a body of art. A critic can here say that the artistic statement of La La Land is the primacy of a brutal reality: ‘There is no betrayal of this statement, you just don’t like it.’ Yet the contradiction is even worse in that case, for every part of, and every performance within La La Land is an arms-upraised exaltation of, not brutal reality, but of one’s power to create a new experience within it. This is the more powerful message to transmit, for the healing it projects spills out beyond itself, to redeem all of Los Angeles, to uplift all of cinema.

If you’d like to experience the film as it ought to have been, there’s an easily identifiable moment at which you can press stop. Having achieved professional success, Emma Stone’s character enters Seb’s lounge with her new husband, and the climactic dance number of healing ensues. The camera settles onto Emma Stone sitting now with Ryan Gosling, and they kiss. While their lips are joined, you must stop the film. The story is complete. You’ve just seen one of the greatest movies of our time. What Chazelle then decided to do with it need be no concern of yours, or of mine. 

Alex Light is a musician, podcaster, writer, and producer of The Mandarin.