Andrew Neiman's Drumming-of-Age
The 2014 movie Whiplash is not officially described as a coming-of-age narrative, but the way the values of the protagonist Andrew Neiman (Miles Teller) are challenged by his mentor Terence Fletcher (J.K. Simmons) and his family all follow the patterns of a coming-of-age narrative. Andrew has been an ambitious drummer for as long as he can remember. But after joining the prestigious conductor Fletcher's special ensemble, the conductor's emotionally abusive style of teaching introduces to Andrew intense anxieties about his future for the first time, pushing him to practice the drums to the point of bleeding. Andrew believes in Fletcher's philosophy of giving one hundred percent effort towards your art to become great, so his ambition to become great constantly pushes him to great stress and pain. We watch Andrew himself curse his own supposed shortcomings whenever he is humiliated by Fletcher, showing his concurrence with Fletcher's ideas. ...
