All language subtitles for Module 39

And now

let's talk about timing, how we slow down

and speed up shots to control
rhythm in la la land.

We do this smash cut into.

A party scene.

We establish the season again
and the season is something that is

very important or was very important
to Damien in terms of telling his story.

He saw this as different chapters
in different seasons,

and he wanted to set that up
because he wanted

to create a bunch of cycles
that the audience would get used to.

So in the very beginning we start,
if you remember, we start with winter

when the camera pans down to see

the traffic jam, it's winter.

Then we go through the other seasons,

we go through spring, we go through fall
and we go through winter.

And the hope was that
by creating this cycle with these titles,

that we would create a certain

amount of

expectation with the audience
and by creating expectations.

Damien's hope
was that he could do something unexpected.

So later in the story,
this comes into play

when we come back to winter,
but it's something very different.

And again,
this was a scene that relied on.

The beginning of it,
the relying on a long,

unbroken take.

But one that we ended up
having to manipulate.

We knew we had to manipulate the speed
of it in order to hit certain beats.

So somewhere in here,
we put a little slow down.

We slowed the image down.

And again, this is because the way Damien
designed the film, we had to find ways

to compress and expand time,
but we couldn't do it

with the editing for the most part,
or often we had to do it within shots.

And this at the time out a

certain way because there was
a prerecorded song and certain moments

had to be in sync at the exact moment
Damian wanted in the song.

So that's why it was necessary
for us to play around

with the speed of the image.

The Shot, for example,

is playing at a different speed,
was not playing at 24 friends.

We had to slow it down
to get enough of the look we wanted

from Emma Stone.

And again,
this is a scene that's very reliant

on the faces of these movie
stars, the faces of

Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone.

And without those faces,
you don't really have a scene.

And this was actually quite challenging
to get the timing

the way Damien wanted because the camera
was moving in on both Ryan Gosling.

And separately moving in on Emma Stone.

And in some cases

we had to add some pushes digitally.

I added some zooms on
some of the shots like on me a little bit

to make them match a little bit better.

But it was
it was actually very challenging to get

all the looks we wanted in here because
sometimes the action was happening.

Overlapping was.

There was something that Emma Stone
was doing that we really loved,

but we needed to cut to Ryan
at a certain point and vice versa.

So it was very hard
to get all the pieces we wanted in

and we were able to do that.

By manipulating
some of the speeds of some of the shots

and here Damian wanted a very hard cut
no pre lap

just we play around with hard cuts
we play around pre laps.

This was something that just felt best
to do a time cut, a clean time cut.

And we did that musically.

It was important to Damien to set up

Ryan Gosling looking as silly as possible.

So he's wearing this, this crazy
red outfit, something very different

from sometimes what you see him
wearing in the rest of the movie.

Wearing these silly glasses and looking
kind of kind of kind of silly to,

you know, to help set up the
the conversation they're about to have.

And for this sequence,

it was very important to cut it,

have the pace of it be somewhat quick.

Damien really wanted to have it.

The conversation
feel very biting and very cutting,

and he wanted it to feel that way
with the dialog, with the performance,

but he wanted it to feel that way
a little bit with the editing,

and it's part of him doing that.

Whereas if we cut faster back and forth
between these two.

Two of the same angles,
you'd really feel it a little bit more.

And the idea

is he wanted you to feel some of the cuts,
at least in a subtle way.

So you would you would feel that there was
something that wasn't smooth about this.

There was it wasn't
it wasn't seamless or invisible

or very different from the storytelling
that's in other parts of the stories

which where the storytelling is through

smooth kind of camera moves.

We do come in here

to play off, play this little move here.

But again, we quickly
go back into singles, back and forth,

answering each other.

And part of this is also because Damian.

Damian

is a director who loves

beautiful frames.

He loves little details.

So this little butterfly

flying in the background,
Damien wanted to feature that.

And I thought that was a good
point to break things up.

This is a point

where when the other band member comes in.

It's something another again.

Sound plays a key factor in this,

where Damien really wanted to hear
the sound of the guy hitting his chest.

He wanted it to sound like
Ryan was being attacked almost.

You really wanted it to be offensive.

I mean, all the way up there, except

because I don't.

He doesn't tell me what to do.

He just told you what I know.

I let him.

What's your name, man?

Yeah.

I guess I'll see you in the movies.

Damien.

Always like this shot of him
putting the glasses back on because

it really looked like
we had reversed the shot

because he puts the glasses on
in such an awkward way.

But that's actually really the way
Ryan Gosling did it.

And for some reason,
it looks completely wrong.

It looks like it's backwards,
but it's not me.

Yeah.

I'll see you

would just

and here's something that's also
very important and something we worked

really hard on
and very closely with Justin Hurwitz

and also very closely
with our music editor Jason Ruder.

The the place where music hits.

So where this song ends,

it meant that we had to find an edit
somewhere in here

so that so that the song would end
the way you hear it.

I know. I let.

What's your name?

Matt.

Yeah, I guess I'll see you.

We're just kind of.

It's important to Damien
that transitions like that

are perfect, the way he's envisioned them
or the way he's heard them.

So a music working out like that
has to ring out a certain way on the cut.

And sometimes we can do that by control
the picture, but a lot of times

we have to manipulate the music
a certain way.

And sometimes with

other filmmakers you can

get away with cheating the music
a certain way.

You can make a cut, hide a cut

in the music somewhere during the scene.

But with Damien, he is a musician,
so you can't really hide anything.

You have to

have the music work musically, and

so that sometimes that means that I have
to recut the picture in order to follow.