Whiplash Has a Happy Ending (And That Rules)

Im commenting so late haha but I took the movie to be a story as someone who would/should goes down the self-reflection and choosing family and love. I always felt uncomfortable as you said, he got what he wanted, but should he have wanted it, is it actially good for him. The movie leaves you with such a unique unease i think exactly for the reasons you said. You cant quite say its definitively a sad/bad ending. That onyl works if you starr the movie with your own preconcepctions of what is good for him. This video really helped me put my finger on that unease :)

A lot late to this, but I'd see that its more ambiguous, its happy in the sense they both got what they wanted but wa sit really in the right way? I think its really questioning if tough love really is the best when it meant neman lost everything else in his life to get this one thing. I wouldn't say its a distraction from things for him but that the movie is more looking at the relationship between him and fletcher and the ambiguous nature of that. Is it right we break human beings to bring out the best in them? What if he just broke instead? Is that abuse granted if he does become great? And what about the kid they mentioned that offed himself becuase of fletchers influence? I think its easy to see it in a strictly good or bad ending but what gets me is that we'll never know and just have to question it.

When I was in art school I had a number of lecturers who did this to me. I studied animation film making and wanted to be an animator, but this was back before CGI, so you had to be an astonishing draftsperson and a great actor in order to get work. Of the 150 students I started with, only 12 graduated four years later, and 25 years after that there are fewer than 5 of my graduating class still working in film. I credit those hard nosed lecturers with whatever success I’ve had. If they’d have held my hand and stroked my hair like students today seem to expect, I would probably be working at ihop today.

I immediately saw it as a revenge movie of sorts. Someone who gave up so much control wrestles it back in the end and manages to achieve an autonomy and agency that no one would or could give him. He completely commandeers the stage for the finale and forces Fletcher to bend to his will. The satisfaction is that he owns what he’s become, despite everything in his life attempting to compromise his goals and take pieces of the credit for his transformation. I definitely found it gratifying, but I don’t know if it’s happy exactly.

Yeah the protagonist of Whiplash is one of those characters that doesn't actually have that much going for him outside of his one particular talent. He's a major dick, he doesn't show interest in his family or girlfriend, he has no friends, he doesn't seem to have any hobbies or interests outside of drumming. Even though the ending is kind of a win for his awful abuser, it's also the only possible win for himself.

Glad I’m not the only one who thinks it’s cool that the protagonist achieved a major breakthrough as a musician and made his dream come true. Sure it’s sad for his family and girlfriend to “lose” him, but I’m not his girlfriend. Why should I care. As someone who also plays instruments and has a lot of artistic pursuits, I actually got a bit jealous of the protagonist at the end. I kinda sorta also want to make this deal with the devil. Does this make me a bad daughter to my family? Maybe, but you win some you lose some.

I thought this was gonna be about the roller derby movie and boy was I in for a surprise

Great one BJ, love your seductive cadence <3 ;)

I think *you* kinda rock, Big Joel! :-)

I think it's also important to note the cinematography in the final scene. The fact that the lights go out on Fletcher and the spotlights go on Neiman. A testament to the fact that Neiman has transcended the abuse and is allowed to embrace his drumming for what it is: his passion. We could go on and on about how art is not in black and white and there's lots of gray yada yada, but I think that final moment where Fletcher stands in awe and is removed from neiman's grandstand is what really makes it a happy ending.

I love this take. The fact is that many of the greatest performers of all time in many disciplines have been deeply obsessive and socially unhealthy. Who are we to say they should have been different? What if some great art is the product of obsession and abuse? Does the success justify the means? It's cool to have media that asks these questions without spoonfeeding us the answers.

I really like this take. The film left me somewhat confused when I watched it, with a general feeling of greatness, but a wonder at whether it was praising/glorifying the abuse all along. And no, it showed the abuse in multiple facets and the abuse wins in the end, but without actually glorifying it and pushing the cinematic exercise to its fullest. Good video for me; but I'm not sure if the argument as you make it would really explain the idea clearly to people who don't see it that way.

I appreciate this but I don't know if I buy it. I agree that none of the alternatives you presented would have helped him, even that there's value in interpreting the strange and uncomfortable ending of the movie as happy in a sense -- but honestly I have trouble believing it. I genuinely don't believe there's a human on earth for whom the only possible path to joy is pleasing their abuser. It makes sense that the protagonist would believe this about himself, and I even find the idea of a movie that believes it with him interesting, but at the end of the day it's a delusion. There can be no lasting joy in that place, as you say in the video, its likely the rest of his life will be sad and hollow. And that, to me, is what makes the ending sad -- as much as this trust in abusive systems (which is so often a product of abuse) seems to be validated by the movie on some kind of a metaphysical level to me it feels like the movie is creating this sense of delusion on purpose, that it's begging the audience to mistrust it. No matter how hard the movie tries to convince us, to matter how much reality bends to accommodate the protagonist's worldview, some part of the watcher knows implicitly that it isn't true, that there is no fulfillment to be found, that as the lights go off and the curtains close things are not okay and that they never can be. Whatever it is he's been looking for, he hasn't found it, or maybe there's nothing to be found at all.