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Seeing La La Land (🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟) in a sold out IMAX theater in Los Angeles this weekend for the film’s 10 year anniversary was emotionally devastating. Sheer, unadulterated devastation. I haven’t cried like that in months. My contacts nearly fell out of my eyes. I believe La La Land is one of the great films of our time - a generational masterpiece. Seeing it again this morning reaffirmed my belief. Every last note is perfect. Every last frame is stunning. A love story about choosing between what you love and who you love, movies like this just don’t come around very often. I’m so thankful I had chance to celebrate one decade of a film I hope to spend my entire life rewatching. “Maybe you just liked me when I was on my ass because it made you feel better about yourself.” It’s so hard to put into words how painful this line is from Ryan Gosling’s Sebastian to Emma Stone’s Mia because Mia’s love for Sebastian was so pure. Do you know how rare it is to find passionate people in this world? A world that “worships everything & values nothing”, to quote Sebastian. Sebastian is a character who is defined by his passion for jazz. His love & devotion to jazz is raw and untainted & it’s his reason for living. Then consider how much more rare it is to find a partner/lover like Mia who sees how passionate someone is about something & doesn’t try to dim that passion or stand in its way - instead, she genuinely wants to see that passion bloom. Mia was perhaps the only person out of 7 billion people on Earth who believed in Sebastian & still saw something in him. Yet in this moment, he weaponizes that support. It’s just one of truly at least three or four moments in this film that will always bring me to my knees. Those of you who read my scathing reviews of Emilia Perez last year know that 1) I’m a violinist of 25 years & 2) have spent my life playing in pits & live-orchestras. All of which is to say that I’m highly critical of music in films. When added to a film, whether it be Emilia Perez or here in La La Land, the purpose of the music is to push the audience closer to the characters’ emotions. Perez doesn’t do that in the slightest. La La Land achieves that in the absolute fullest. All it takes is 3 piano notes. 3 notes. 3 key strokes. That’s it. And you’re immediately reminded of the love that was - and wasn’t - between Mia & Sebastian. THAT is how you effectively deploy music to tell a story -THAT is how Cinema & music are supposed to collide. The music in this film is like gasoline dumped on an emotional bonfire. One of the lasting, most memorable moments of this morning’s viewing was the dance sequence between Gosling & Stone in the Hollywood hills as the sunsets behind them. I’m reminded during this viewing that this iconic sequence was real - the backdrop isn’t CGI or fake in any sense, Gosling & Stone really did this choreography while the sun set behind them. Seeing it in IMAX was…stunning. Jaw-dropping. Beyond words. I was reminded of the power of Cinema. Of what Cinema is truly capable of when done right - when made as real as possible. This was one of the handful of moments that brought me to tears because it’s just so incredibly honest. I cannot imagine anyone else playing Sebastian & Mia other than Gosling & Stone. It goes back to what I said in the opener…this film is utterly perfect. La La Land deserved to win the Oscar for Best Picture. It deserves all the accolades in the world. Simply one of my favorite films of all time.