Episode 10

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Published on:

27th Aug 2025

Whiplash (2014 Sundance Award Winner)

The tenth episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 2014 features the Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury Prize winner, Damien Chazelle’s Whiplash. Written and directed by Damien Chazelle and starring Miles Teller, J.K. Simmons, Paul Reiser and Melissa Benoist, Whiplash won both the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival.

The contemporary reviews quoted in this episode come from A.O. Scott in The New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/10/movies/in-whiplash-a-young-jazz-drummer-vs-his-teacher.html), Peter Debruge in Variety (https://variety.com/2014/film/reviews/sundance-film-review-whiplash-1201061948/), and Ann Hornaday in The Washington Post (https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/whiplash-movie-review-for-jk-simmons-a-triumph-of-musical-terror/2014/10/16/d21b67f2-53a1-11e4-892e-602188e70e9c_story.html).

Check out more info and the entire archive of past episodes at https://www.awesomemovieyear.com and visit us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/awesomemovieyear 

You can find Jason on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/JHarrisComedy/, on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/jasonharriscomedy/ and on Letterboxd at https://letterboxd.com/goforjason/

You can find Josh online at http://joshbellhateseverything.com/, on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/joshbellhateseverything/, on Bluesky at signalbleed.bsky.social and on Letterboxd at https://letterboxd.com/signalbleed/

If you’re a Letterboxd user and you watch any of the movies we talk about on the show, tag your review “Awesome Movie Year” to share your thoughts.

You can find our producer David Rosen and his Piecing It Together Podcast at https://www.piecingpod.com, on Twitter at @piecingpod, on Bluesky at piecingpod.bsky.social and on Letterboxd at https://letterboxd.com/bydavidrosen/ 

Join the Popcorn & Puzzle Pieces Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/piecingpod for more movie discussion and our Awesome Movie Year audience choice polls.

All of the music in the episode is by David Rosen. Find more of his music at https://www.bydavidrosen.com

Subscribe on Patreon to support the show and get access to exclusive content from Awesome Movie Year and Piecing It Together, plus music by David Rosen: https://www.patreon.com/bydavidrosen

Please like, share, rate and comment on the show and this episode, and tune in for the next 2014 episode, featuring the Academy Awards Best Picture winner, Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Birdman.

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About the Podcast

Awesome Movie Year
All Points West
Awesome Movie Year is a podcast co-hosted by film critic Josh Bell and filmmaker and comedian Jason Harris. Each season looks at why a certain year was an awesome movie year. Each episode focuses on a different film from the year being investigated. Produced by David Rosen of the Piecing It Together Podcast for the All Points West Podcast Network
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About your host

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David Rosen

David Rosen is a music composer and podcast producer. He has scored feature films, commercials and more, as well as creating albums of instrumental music. He currently produced Piecing It Together which he hosts and Awesome Movie Year.