Watch the original Whiplash short film

Before Whiplash was a Best Picture nominee and Oscar winner in three categories, it was an 18 minute short. Directed by Damien Chazelle and still starring that furious (and now Oscar winning) performance from J.K. Simmons, the short is basically a sequence from the full film, but without Miles Teller. If you can't afford a ticket to the real thing, or your not sure if the film is quite your tempo, then give the short a watch and see where it all began.

Screen Actors Guild Award Winners 2015

Over the weekend, we had the Producer's Guild Awards and the Screen Actor's Guild Awards announce their winners for the past year of film making. At the PGA's, the producers of Birdman, The Lego Movie, TV's Breaking Bad and Fargo won the big prizes while there was a fascinating spread of movies that won at the SGA's. Below I have listed the nominees (for the movie categories) and in bold are the winners. Not one movie had two winners, meaning that The Theory of Everything, Still Alice, Whiplash, Boyhood and Birdman all picked up awards. It's great to see all these films picking up something and it will be very interesting to see if this is repeated at the Oscars.

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role
STEVE CARELL Foxcatcher
BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH The Imitation Game
JAKE GYLLENHAAL Nightcrawler
MICHAEL KEATON Birdman
EDDIE REDMAYNE The Theory of Everything

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role
JENNIFER ANISTON Cake
FELICITY JONES The Theory of Everything
JULIANNE MOORE Still Alice
ROSAMUND PIKE Gone Girl
REESE WITHERSPOON Wild

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role
ROBERT DUVALL The Judge
ETHAN HAWKE Boyhood
EDWARD NORTON Birdman
MARK RUFFALO Foxcatcher
J.K. SIMMONS Whiplash

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role
PATRICIA ARQUETTE Boyhood
KEIRA KNIGHTLEY The Imitation Game
EMMA STONE Birdman
MERYL STREEP Into the Woods 
NAOMI WATTS St Vincent

Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture
BIRDMAN
BOYHOOD

 THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL

THE IMITATION GAME

 THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING

Whiplash Review

When determined young drummer Andrew is spotted by a maniacal professor, his passion for music becomes tainted by an obsession with becoming the best. Andrew is at the top music conservatory in New York and is taken under the wing of the abusive Fletcher, soon finding himself as the core drummer for Fletcher’s jazz band. With Fletcher using verbal, physical and psychological abuse in order to get the best from his students, will Andrew be able to cut it in the cutthroat business of competitive music?

Whiplash is a warped film with an deliciously dubious message. J.K. Simmons is getting all the plaudits for his performance with critics clearly as impressed by him as writer/director Damien Chazelle is by his character. Based in part on Chazelle’s own feelings towards his high school band instructor, there is clearly a complex love/hate thing going on. It’s easy to see why, with Simmons being an actor it’s easy to love, but in Whiplash delivering a terrifying performance that gets results from his scared stiff students. The film ultimately justifies his completely out-of-order antics, suggesting that an authoritarian, dictatorial and sadistic stance can bring the best out of the little people. Lucky for the little people that Miles Teller also smashes out a blinding performance as Andrew, a guy who will go to bloody lengths to impress.

What is so strange about Whiplash though, is that it almost completely forgets about the enjoyment of making music. In the pursuit of perfection, the band members have become joyless prisoners. Fletcher has them standing at attention like soldiers prepared for a war. They clutch their instruments like their lives depend on them. Chazelle emphasises all this by shooting and cutting the film with an urgency that should bring out the rhythm and joy of jazz, but instead makes it feel like an edge of the seat thriller, where lives are at stake.

Fletcher is a bully who gets what he wants from Andrew by using any means necessary. Whiplash is a film that strives for perfection and brings out the thrill in low budget, committed and quick filmmaking having been shot in just 18 days. It is a film about the sacrifices required to be the best at something, even if it means cowering in front of a madman and losing the enjoyment in doing what you love.

Watch the trailer:

More awards-bait film reviews from I Love That Film:

Testament of Youth Review

The Theory of Everything Review

Into the Woods Review

American Sniper Review

Unbroken Review

And more on awards season:

Golden Globes Gambling

Top 10 Best True Stories of 2014