Learning Journey - Directing Influences

One of my biggest influences as a director is Damien Chazelle. Director of films such as "Whiplash" (2014), Chazelle succeeds in building stories whose vibrant visual language translates into a tense, enigmatic and emotional cinema. On an interview for website MUBI, Chazelle has said:

"For me, the narrative is a means to an end, a film comes to a point where it is just about image and sound, and hopefully the story will help built that apparatus." (D. Chazelle, 2019). 

(Damien Chazelle on set of "La La Land")

This meaning that Chazelle supports the notion that cinema is a visual media. It's story and narrative it's presented to us through the visuals, this being not only elements of the mise-en-scéne but also the actors on the screen. That being said, throughout all of his films, Chazelle explores themes such as "Obsession to succeed" and "Following your Dreams", both "Whiplash" and "La La Land" being the prime examples of this. His characters are more than often dreamers, whose main goal is the most important element towards their fulfillment. However, instead of painting his characters in an unrealistic story of success, Chazelle grounds his characters in reality. After the release of his latest, picture, "First Man" (2018), Chazelle has said:

"Speaking to Ryan Gosling, after Neil Armstrong goes pouching through the atmosphere, he has to come back down and do things like pick up the trash and take care of his kids."

 

(Still from "First Man") 

This shows that even though his characters are involved in big events or dreams, Chazelle prefers to ground them with reality by allowing the audience to observe they're normal Quotidian. As a director, I am very interested in character-based stories and by studying the works of Damien Chazelle, I am inspired to bring an approach to my films that is based on reality while also making use of all the cinematic tools on my belt in order to visually tell a story through image and sound.