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The film was about a drummer named Andrew (Miles Teller) who will do anything to be a great musician, and the teacher who can get him there, Fletcher (J.K. Simmons), even if his methods include...
Mar 23, 2017 · Whiplash is considered a great film, but listed below are four reasons why it is a modern classic. 1. Career-Making Performances. Before Whiplash, J.K. Simmons was more or less a character actor, never fully reaching his dramatic potential.
Oct 7, 2014 · Writer/director Damien Chazelle turns the music movie genre on its head with Whiplash, an intense, exhilarating psychological drama that’s built around riveting, award-worthy performances by...
The Drum Thing, or, A Brief History of Whiplash, or, “I’m Generalizing Here”. (Tony Williams and Buddy Rich. Image lifted from Vince Wilburn, Jr.’s Twitter feed) (Elvin Jones and Buddy Rich. Image lifted from Dave Liebman’s Facebook. Both these photos showed up on Mark Stryker’s Twitter, that’s how I found them.
- Desire
- A Closer Look at Andrew
- Double It!
- Not Quite My Tempo
- Blindfolded by Technicality
- A Descent Into Madness
- Who Is The Enemy: Fletcher Or Mediocrity?
- Tragedy Veiled as Triumph
- The Cost of Greatness
- An Inversion of Morals
They say that the first scenes of a film define the essence of its narrative. In Whiplash, the desire for greatness is signalled early on as the major theme. Andrew practises alone with focus and determination in the opening scenes, seeking to push the boundaries of his own capabilities as a drummer. From this, we learn that he yearns for an opport...
In the opening stages of Whiplash Andrew is portrayed as a vulnerable yet optimistic character. He seems capable of maintaining a balance between his passion for music and a life outside of it, visiting the cinema with his father and cultivating a possible relationship with a woman he admires. Yet we learn that such comforts are momentary features ...
For a moment, we feel relief for Andrew’s accomplishments: his hard work and effort are paying off. But, as we may suspect, it doesn’t last. The sense of approval he feels from Fletcher is almost immediately replaced by doubt, whose standards always demand more. Andrew has to raise his game if he is to gain further approval. It is at this stage of ...
The standards Andrew must reach now are immense. Andrew has to want this. Does he? ‘Were you rushing or were you dragging?’ Fletcher asks Andrew as Andrew struggles to play the song ‘Whiplash’ at the correct tempo. The differences in tempo between Andrew’s successive failed attempts and the correct tempo are non-existent to the untrained ear—such a...
Music is often seen as a sensual medium that either exudes, explores, or is created from the senses. But Whiplash provides the other side, dwelling on the importance of technicality more than its experiential impact. Fletcher pushes Andrew to his technical edge without any interest in what Andrew wants to express in his drumming. A contradiction of...
With his heavy breathing intensified to signal a violation of his old self, we are raised with a question that haunts the waking minds of those who resonate with the turn of events: if the path to greatness necessarily leads to a descent into madness, should we be pursuing it at all? There is always more to achieve and infinite more ways to be bett...
In the middle of what was going on with Andrew, in the development of Fletcher’s character, a thin line is being drawn between constructive criticism and abuse of authority. Fletcher claims he wanted Andrew to be brilliant, which required the strongest of mental challenges. But, arguably, Fletcher was of the same power-hungry, influence-wielding dy...
In the end, we are shown a sequence of Andrew finally being able to break free from humility and pursue an image that he thought he built not for Fletcher but for himself. Yet this was the image that Fletcher wanted to see in Andrew, too! Fletcher deployed his divisive methods on Andrew and others to achieve exactly this kind of reaction. Andrew an...
Before I finalise my thoughts, I want to take a step back to reflect on Andrew’s story, with particular regard for one scene. Pursuits of greatness have a tendency to cultivate a feeling of loneliness and isolation. The more we establish a difference and individuate ourselves from the majority, the more we lose our connection to the crowd, therefor...
To conclude my sentiments, it could be argued that greatness is but an illusion created by our instincts to succeed and overbear. But in the direction of the late 20th century, up until the present, we have seen and experienced a shift in mindset with regard to what the author Colin Wilson calls as the ‘unheroic hypothesis’ of ‘The Age of Defeat’. ...
There is nonsense, but man, some people just can't turn it off and, despite certain claims, the psychological component and relationship between JK and Teller is really not that unbelievable if you stop for a second to think how people around the world train young kids.
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Whiplash gets far more credit than it deserves imho. The characterization is forced and the representation of jazz is weak, at best. First of all, the story of Charlie Parker having the cymbal lauched at his head is apocryphal.
