“Last night some of the guys in the band were talking about that movie, Whiplash. After watching this cloddish potboiler about an aspiring drummer's experience in jazz school, the jazz players I know either go berserk with indignation and/or howl with derisive laughter. Many jazzers, including pianist Ethan Iverson and Richard Brody of the New Yorker, have written about this ignorant and mendacious film, so I won't belabor the point.
Suffice to say that Whiplash has nothing to do with actual jazz unless you consider it to be a species of martial arts, as Buddy Rich often did. It makes Paris Blues with Paul Newman and Sidney Poitier look like a golden edifice of verisimilitude. I'm not saying Whiplash shouldn't be seen in theaters, though. It should, at midnight, along with Plan 9 from Outer Space and, especially, Glen or Glenda.”
(h/t to OpenTune @ DW)
As if I needed another reason to love Donald Fagen. Thank you Donald for lambasting this turd trying to pass for good cinema. I hated this movie so much, and felt so alone - until I started reading Fagen's commentary. Bless you Donald.
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