ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with a seven-and-a-half-minute fantasy musical sequence that, in a dance montage restaging the entire final section of La La Land, imagines a happy ending for Mia and Seb. La La Land opened to nearly rapturous praise after premiering at multiple film festivals globally in the fall of 2016, followed by rave reviews and big grosses when it started its commercial runs in December, after which it swept many guild awards in Hollywood. A fair assessment of La La Land falls somewhere in between the rapture and the condemnation. To start with, La La Land is very knowing about the generic history that preceded it, starting with the bright, bold color scheme that calls to mind the vividly saturated palette of studio-era Technicolor musicals. For whether in terms of its being praised or critiqued, what La La Land made evident in 2016 is that the Hollywood musical continues to mean something important for audiences.
