As the year wraps up, one film sure to be a part of the year-end discussion is Damien Chazelle’s acclaimed “Whiplash.” In an effort to keep word-of-mouth going – and no doubt to help any chances for awards – Chazelle is back doing the interview rounds for the film.
In a chat with ScreenCrush, Chazelle explained the difficulty of bringing his film to the screen in an industry where “likability” rules all, saying “I don’t like the idea the viewer can kind of sit there and go, ‘make me like this person.’ People aren’t inherently sympathetic.”
But more interestingly, the filmmaker – whom we named in our list of 20 Breakthrough Directors – gives his theories on what happens to his characters after the end of the film **SPOILERS AHEAD** . The fiery finale of the movie sees Fletcher and Andrew battle each other on stage, and then come together for a magical music (and movie) moment. It’s a showdown of ego and talent, but asked about where it goes from there, Chazelle has a grim future in mind for the pair.
“I think it’s definitely a fleeting thing. I think there’s a certain amount of damage that will always have been done. Fletcher will always think he won and Andrew will be a sad, empty shell of a person and will die in his 30s of a drug overdose," the director said. "I have a very dark view of where it goes.” Chazelle even went on to joke that the characters’ fates could be “a post credit thing, like the Marvel movies. It’s [Andrew’s] funeral.”
And finally, a couple of months ago Chazelle stopped by the New York Film Festival as part of the NYFF Live series where he had a 50-minute-long conversation about the movie. Watch it below and catch “Whiplash” in theaters now.