Just yesterday during a Periscope Q&A, someone asked me for my most anticipated movies of the fall. The clear #1 choice: La La Land, the latest film from Whiplash writer and director Damien Chazelle. One day later, the first teaser for the film is here, and I’m even more excited to see the movie, which opens later this fall following a premiere next month at the prestigious Venice Film Festival.

The film stars Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone as a pair of lovers in Los Angeles. La La Land is also a musical, as evidenced by the scenes of the couple dancing through L.A. (and even into outer space in one lovely image) and of Gosling crooning and whistling. The visuals look stunning; Linus Sandgren, who shot Joy and American Hustle, is the cinematographer. And the cast also includes J.K. Simmons, who won an Oscar for Chazelle’s Whiplash as Miles Teller’s domineering music teacher.

Whiplash is one of my very favorite movies from the last few years; I’m not sure any movie I’ve seen this decade has inspired more intense and thoughtful discussions as that one did about the nature of talent, art, and education, and whether the film’s bombastic ending is a happy one or a tragic one. Chazelle, who also co-wrote 10 Cloverfield Lane, is one of the most promising young directors in Hollywood (he’s just 31, the talented youthful jerk), and La La Land looks like it will push him even further into exciting and adventurous filmmaking territory. It opens in theaters on December 2.

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