La La Land (2016) reviews

The Fuzzy Mushroom take on La La Land

By Fuzzy Mushroom · Updated 11 November 2026 · The Pros 97 · The Punters 91 · Spore Score 95 · How we write our takes

The Pros and The Punters on La La Land

La La Land is a modern musical that won over both camps. The Pros give it 97, The Punters 91, and the Spore Score is 95. The 6-point gap is small. Critics fell for Damien Chazelle's love letter to old Hollywood. Audiences agreed, though a few were not sold on the idea of a musical with leads who are not trained singers, or on its bittersweet ending.

What it does well

In Los Angeles, Mia (Emma Stone), an aspiring actress working in a studio coffee shop, keeps running into Sebastian (Ryan Gosling), a jazz pianist who dreams of opening his own club. Over four seasons they fall in love and push each other towards their ambitions, until success starts pulling them in different directions.

The opening number, filmed on a jammed motorway interchange, announces the film's confidence. Stone and Gosling have easy chemistry and make the dancing look like something real people might do, which is the point. Justin Hurwitz's songs, especially City of Stars and Audition, are lovely, and the colours are straight out of a 1950s studio musical. The epilogue, a wordless what-if sequence, is the film's masterstroke.

Where people push back

The singing is modest, and jazz fans have pointed out the irony of a film about saving jazz that centres on a white man explaining it. The middle act sags. Some viewers find the ending deflating rather than moving.

Context

La La Land won six Oscars, including Best Director for Chazelle and Best Actress for Stone, and is remembered for the night it was wrongly announced as Best Picture before the award went to Moonlight.

The Fuzzy Mushroom verdict

Must-see, with a Spore Score of 95. A gorgeous, heartfelt musical about the cost of dreams. The Pros and The Punters agree, and so do we.